Applications for hazardous substances consent

regulation 37B(3) of The Planning and Building Regulations (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 1990

• Status not determined
• Requires proof of a state of mind
• Summary only
• Housing, planning, heritage and land

This offence was read from the text as made, and no revised version was available, so a later revocation could not be ruled out. Check the current text at legislation.gov.uk.

What the provision says

3 If any person issues

a certificate which purports to comply with the requirements of regulations made by virtue of paragraph (2) and which contains

a statement which he knows to be false or misleading in

a material particular, or recklessly issues

a certificate which purports to comply with those requirements and which contains

a statement which is false or misleading in

a material particular, he shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to

a fine not exceeding level

3 on the standard scale.

Text as made, from legislation.gov.uk. © Crown copyright, reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.

Who it binds, and what has to be proved

Binds

a person

Conduct

making a false or misleading statement

Fault element

Requires proof of a state of mind

Burden of proof

No statutory defence — prosecution proves everything

The prosecution must prove both that the conduct happened and that it was done with the state of mind the provision names (recklessly).

The provision states no defence, so the prosecution bears the burden on every element of the offence.

Classifier’s reasoning: mens rea word in the offence-creating words: recklessly.

What would breach regulation 37B(3)?

These are illustrations, not law. They are generated from the provision’s own words to show the shape of the offence. Whether any particular conduct is caught depends on the full text, on any amendment since, and on the facts.

1. Entering a figure on a form or return that is known to be wrong under the Planning and Building Regulations (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 1990.
2. Leaving out something the form asks for, where the omission is what makes the answer misleading.
3. Producing a document to an official that has been altered since it was issued.

Penalty

Mode of trial

Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court

Maximum fine

£1,000

Standard scale

Level 3

Maximum prison (summary)

Not determined

in Northern Ireland a reference to a level is construed as referring to the standard scale as it currently stands (Fines and Penalties (NI) Order 1984 art.5(3)), not as it stood when the instrument was made.

Sentencing

Offences of this kind are usually sentenced under the guidelines below. This is a mapping by subject, not a finding about this provision, and the links go to a search of the Sentencing Council’s own site.

• Environmental offences: definitive guideline Magistrates' courts and the Crown Court in England and Wales · in force from 1 July 2014

  Covers unauthorised or harmful deposit, treatment or disposal of waste, illegal discharges to air, land and water, and the equivalent offences committed by organisations. It is the guideline that introduced turnover bands for corporate fines, so the size of the defendant company is a starting point rather than a mitigating detail.

• Reduction in sentence for a guilty plea: definitive guideline All courts in England and Wales · in force from 1 June 2017

  The sliding scale of credit for pleading guilty, from one third at the first stage of proceedings downwards.

• General guideline: overarching principles All courts in England and Wales · in force from 1 October 2019

  The guideline a court uses when there is no offence-specific guideline, which is the position for the overwhelming majority of offences created by statutory instrument. It sets out how culpability and harm are assessed from first principles.

• Totality: definitive guideline All courts in England and Wales

  How to sentence more than one offence at once so that the total is just and proportionate - frequently in point here, because regulatory prosecutions commonly charge several breaches of the same instrument.

Prosecution figures

No published per-offence figure was found for this provision, and it could not be matched to a Ministry of Justice offence code. Offences created by statutory instrument very largely do not have one. Absence of a figure is not evidence that the offence is unused.

Status and lifecycle

Current status

Status not determined

Made

24 July 1990

In force from

Not determined

Extent

Not stated

How this was established: read from the text as made; no revised version available, so later revocation could not be ruled out.

What the instrument is for

(This note is not part of the Order) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

Part II of this Order makes miscellaneous amendments to the Planning (Northern Ireland) Order 1972 and related enactments. The principal amendments are to revise the procedure for making development plans, to provide for simplified planning zones, to confer on the Department of the Environment new powers to require planning applications to be made, to issue discontinuance orders and to enter into planning agreements with developers, to provide for the control of hazardous substances and to provide for the application, with certain modifications, of the planning enactments to Crown land. Part III of the Order makes miscellaneous amendments to the Building Regulations (Northern Ireland) Order 1979. The principal amendments are to provide a right of appeal to the Department against a contravention notice served by a district council, to enable a person to challenge such a notice by obtaining a written report from a qualified person and to prevent the service of such a notice more than eighteen months from the completion of the works in question.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same instrument

• Hazardous substancesarticle 14
• Enforcement of discontinuance ordersarticle 19
• For Article 21 of the principal Order there shall be substituted the following Article— Penalties 21 1 Any…article 37(1)
• Notice requiring planning applicationregulation 16A(5)
• Penaltiesregulation 21(1)
• Penaltiesregulation 21(2)
• Penaltiesregulation 21(2)(a)
• Penaltiesregulation 21(2)(b)
• Subject to this Part, if there is a contravention of hazardous substances control, the appropriate person…regulation 37I(1)
• Enforcement of orders under Article 29Aregulation 50C(1)
• Enforcement of orders under Article 29Aregulation 50C(6)

How this was identified as an offence

Everything above rests on the judgement that this provision creates a criminal offence, rather than mentioning one. That judgement is made by rule, from the words of the provision, and this is the rule that made it — with a confidence of 0.92.

Basis

the provision says a person is “guilty of an offence”

Confidence

0.92 of 1.00

A provision that states a penalty for an offence created elsewhere can read very like one that creates an offence, and the rules can mistake the one for the other. If the text quoted above sets a penalty for something made an offence by another provision, treat the classification on this page with that in mind, and read the instrument.

Check the source

• This provision on legislation.gov.uk The authoritative text. Check it before relying on anything here.
• The Planning and Building Regulations (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 1990 Every offence this instrument creates, and its explanatory note
• Housing, planning, heritage and landOther offences on the same subject
• Offences created in 1990