UK Offence Report

Offences and penalties

regulation 14 of Animal By-Products (Identification) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999 (revoked)

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

14 If any person contravenes, or fails to comply with, any provision of regulation 6, 7, 8, 9 or 10 he shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable— a on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum; or b on conviction on indictment, to a fine.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
contravening a requirement of the instrument
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 regulation 14?

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. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Animal By-Products (Identification) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999, whatever the reason for doing it.
  2. Where the requirement is a positive duty, letting the time for performing it pass without performing it.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Either way — magistrates’ court or Crown Court
Maximum fine
£5,000
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

expressed as the statutory maximum (the prescribed sum): the same words mean £5,000 in England and Wales and £10,000 in Scotland.

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.

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
11 October 1999
In force from
15 November 1999
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 Regulations.) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

These Regulations make provision for the sterilisation and staining of animal by-products (defined in regulation 3) and for the control of the movement of such by-products. They revoke the Meat (Sterilisation and Staining) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1989. The Regulations do not apply to entire dead animals (regulation 4), specified green offal of wild game, by-products removed by a veterinary surgeon or an authorised officer for examination, specified waste from animal by-products, animal by-products imported for scientific purposes, specified animal by-products which are transhipped or specified risk material (regulation 5(1)). The Regulations— a require the immediate staining or sterilisation at a slaughter-house or game processing facility (regulation 6), or at any animal by-products premises (regulation 7), of animal by-products excluding poultry by-products and certain other specified by-products (regulation 5(2)); b prohibit the freezing of any animal by-product in any slaughter-house, game processing facility or animal by-products premises unless it has been sterilised or stained (regulation 8); c prohibit the storing of unsterilised animal by-products in the same room as products which are intended for human consumption and the storing of unsterilised animal by-products which are not properly packed and labelled in premises used for the storage of products fit for human consumption (regulation 9); d prohibit the movement from any slaughter-house, game processing facility or animal by-products premises of unstained or unsterilised animal by-products except in specified circumstances (regulation 10); e make provision for the application of various provisions of the Food Safety (Northern Ireland) Order 1991 (regulation 11); f specify the bodies by whom the Regulations are to be enforced (regulation 12); g require district councils to supply information to the Department of Agriculture as and when required (regulation 13); and h create offences and prescribe penalties (regulation 14).

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

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