Fixing notices to vehicles

article 67(2) of The Road Traffic Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1996

Status not determined
Strict liability
Road traffic and vehicles

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

2 A person is guilty of an offence if he removes or interferes with any notice fixed to
a vehicle under this Article, unless he does so by or under the authority of the driver or person in charge of the vehicle or the person liable for the fixed penalty offence in question.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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: breaching the provision
Fault element: Strict liability
Burden of proof: No statutory defence — prosecution proves everything

The prosecution must prove that the conduct happened. This is a strict liability offence as drafted: the provision uses no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence, so there is no need to show that a person meant to do it, knew about it, or was careless.

Intention, knowledge and carelessness are irrelevant to guilt. They may still matter a great deal to sentence.

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

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision.

What would breach article 67(2)?

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.

Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Road Traffic Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1996.

Penalty

Mode of trial: Not determined
Maximum fine: Not determined
Maximum prison (summary): Not determined

no penalty is stated in this instrument; it may be in the enabling Act, or in a general penalties provision this pass did not connect to the offence.

No penalty was determined from this instrument. It may be in the enabling Act, or in a general penalties provision this pass did not connect to the offence. Absence of a figure here is not evidence that the offence carries no penalty.

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.

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: 15 May 1996
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.

This Order makes provision with respect to the prosecution and punishment (including the punishment without conviction) of road traffic offences in Northern Ireland. Part II deals with various matters concerning the trial of road traffic offences and Part III makes provision with respect to the penalties that may be incurred on conviction of such offences. The mode of prosecuting such offences and the manner in which they may be punished is set out in tabular form in Schedule 1. Penalties on conviction include a fine and, in some cases, imprisonment. In addition a court may (and in certain instances must) on convicting a person of some offences order that he be disqualified for driving or that his licence be endorsed. Penalty points may be attributed where a person is convicted of an offence involving obligatory endorsement of his driving licence. The penalty points are to be taken into account if he is convicted of a further offence. Under Part IV persons alleged to have committed certain road traffic offences may discharge liability to conviction by payment of a fixed penalty.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

What Parliament said

Mentions of this instrument in Hansard. Parliamentary material is reused under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0.

Criminal Justice and Courts Bill Lords · 22 October 2014
112: Before Schedule 5, insert the following new Schedule— ScheduleMutual recognition of driving disqualification in UK and Republic of IrelandPart 1Further provisionCrime (International Co-operation) Act 2003 (c. 32)1 Chapter 1 of Part 3 of the Crime (International Co-operation) Act 2003 (EU Convention on driving disqualifications) is amended as follows. 2 (1) Section 54 (road traffic offences in UK: application…
Immigration Bill Lords · 20 January 2016
119: Schedule 2, page 74, line 4, at end insert— “Road Traffic Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (SI 1996/1320 (NI 10))(1) Part 1 of Schedule 1 to the Road Traffic Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (SI 1996/1320 (NI 10)) is amended as follows. (2) After the entry relating to section 1(3) of the Taxis Act (Northern Ireland) 2008 insert— “Section 2A(8) Failing to return an operator’s licence Summarily…
Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill [Lords] Commons · 26 June 2018 · Tom Brake
First, on new clause 2, I am surprised that the Government do not believe that an understanding of the impact of Brexit on the haulage industry would be helpful to them. I would have thought that it would be. A number of issues have been raised this evening by the hon. Members for York Central (Rachael Maskell) and for Bristol South (Karin Smyth), whose campaigning on this issue has come across. I am sure that the…
Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill [HL] Lords · 4 July 2018 · The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Sugg) (Con)
My Lords, on Amendment 1, alongside the Bill, we are developing regulations relating to the issue of permits for hauliers, which will be laid before Parliament later in the year. These regulations will apply to all existing permit schemes as well as those we may need as part of our future relationship with the EU. Amendment 1 would enable the regulations to specify that the Secretary of State would be able to…

Other offences in the same instrument

A Paragraph (4) does not apply where a person required on any occasion under the preceding provisions of…SCHEDULE 3
Alternative verdictsarticle 26
Alternative verdictsarticle 26(2)
Information as to date of birth and sexarticle 27(3)
Information as to date of birth and sexarticle 27(5)
Interim disqualificationarticle 28(5)
Production of licencearticle 29(2)
Production of licencearticle 29(2)(a)
For the purposes of this Order, an offence involves obligatory endorsement if it is an offence under a…article 3
d Article 18(7) (failing to provide a specimen), where that is an offence involving obligatory…article 35(3)(d)
For the purposes of this Order, an offence involves obligatory disqualification if it is an offence under a…article 4(1)
For the purposes of this Order, an offence involves discretionary disqualification if it is an offence under…article 4(2)

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 Road Traffic Offenders (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 Every offence this instrument creates, and its explanatory note
Road traffic and vehiclesOther offences on the same subject
Offences created in 1996