UK Offence Report

Amendment of the Independent Health Care Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2005

regulation 2 of The Regulation and Improvement Authority (Independent Health Care) (Fees and Frequency of Inspections) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2011

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

Amendment of regulation 42(Offences) 10 For paragraph (1) of regulation 42 (Offences), there shall be substituted the following paragraph— 42 1 A contravention of any of the provisions of regulations 7, 8, 9A, 14, 15, 16(1) to (4), 17 to 32 and 34 to 40 shall be an offence.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
selling or supplying something the instrument restricts
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 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.

  1. Selling the goods under the Regulation and Improvement Authority (Independent Health Care) (Fees and Frequency of Inspections) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2011 where the instrument prohibits the sale outright.
  2. Supplying without carrying out a check the instrument requires first, even where the sale would otherwise be lawful.
  3. Offering for sale counts as well as selling: displaying stock is enough where the provision reaches an offer.

Penalty

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

no penalty is stated here: this instrument amends another one, and the penalty for the offence is in the instrument being amended.

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.

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
25 January 2011
In force from
1 April 2011
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.

These Regulations are made under the Health and Personal Social Services (Quality, Improvement and Regulation) (Northern Ireland) Order 2003 (the Order) and they amend the Independent Health Care Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2005 (“the principal regulations”) and the Regulation and Improvement Authority (Fees and Frequency of Inspections) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2005. Regulation 2 of these Regulations amends the principal regulations as follows: 1 It extends the exceptions to the definition of independent hospital to include – i surgeries or consulting rooms where medical practitioners provide services only under certain arrangements made on behalf of patients by their employers or other specified bodies; and ii establishments where dental treatment is delivered solely under HSC arrangements (regulation 2(3)). 2 It includes in “listed services”, treatments such as haemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis and certain hyperbaric oxygen therapy delivered in sealed compressed air chambers (regulation 2 (4)). 3 It inserts a new regulation 4A into the principal regulations to modify Article 2(7) (b) of the Order to read “dental treatment” with the effect (when account is taken of new regulation 3 (i) to exclude dentists delivering treatment solely within the HSC) of requiring regulation of dental treatment delivered privately (regulation 2(5)). 4 It amends regulation 5 (Meaning of independent clinic) of the principal regulations so that an establishment where medical services are provided only under arrangements made on behalf of patients by their employers and other specified bodies is not to be regarded as an independent clinic (regulation 2(6)). 5 It substitutes regulation 6 (Exception of undertaking from the definition of independent medical agency) of the principal regulations in order to except from the definition of independent medical agency an undertaking which provides medical services under arrangements made on behalf of patients by their employers and other specified bodies (regulation 2(7)). 6 It inserts a new regulation 9A (Requirements for statements of policies and procedures) into the principal regulations to require certain written policies and procedures to be implemented in relation to arrangements for patients in independent hospitals (regulation 2(8)) and it also inserts regulations 39A to 39 E introducing requirements applying to independent hospitals providing mental or psychiatric treatment for mental disorder (regulation 2(9)). 7 It substitutes Regulation 42(1) so that a contravention of regulation 9A is also an offence under the regulations (regulation 2(10)). 8 It amends Schedules 2 & 3 to the principal regulations to update certain statutory references and to substitute the updated Part I table in Schedule 3, relating to records retention. An amendment is introduced to these regulations substituting a new definition of “approved place” to include dentist chairs in dental surgeries and to substitute a new definition of “small establishment” to exclude independent hospitals from the definition (regulation 3).

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 0.88.

Basis
the provision says the conduct “is an offence”; the provision says an offence is committed “if” something happens
Confidence
0.88 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