UK Offence Report

Offence and penalty

regulation 4 of The Novel Foods Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2017

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

4 A person who fails to comply with Article 6(2) (Union list of authorised novel foods) as read with Articles

24 and 35(2) of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283 is guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to

a fine not exceeding level

5 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
failing to do something the instrument requires
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; other provisions of the same instrument use a mens rea word while this one does not (the Cundy v Le Cocq contrast).

What would breach regulation 4?

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. On these words an offence is committed where a person fails to comply with Article 6(2) (Union list of authorised novel foods) as read with Articles 24 and 35(2) of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283.
  2. Not doing what the provision requires under the Novel Foods Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2017, by the time it requires it to be done.
  3. Doing it, but not in the manner or to the standard the instrument specifies.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£5,000
Standard scale
Level 5
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.

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
6 December 2017
In force from
1 January 2018
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 provide for the execution and enforcement of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 November 2015 on novel foods, amending Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council and repealing Regulation (EC) No 258/97 of the European Parliament and of the Council and Commission Regulation (EC) No 1852/2001 (OJ No L 327, 11.12.2015, p 1). These Regulations — a make district councils, within their district, responsible for the enforcement of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283 and these Regulations (regulation 3); b provide that it is an offence for a person to fail to comply with Article 6(2) of the Novel Foods Regulation, punishable on summary conviction by a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale. Article 6(2) provides that only novel foods authorised by the European Commission and included in the European Union’s list of novel foods may be placed on the market within the European Union, and the foods must be in accordance with conditions of use and the labelling requirements set out in the list (regulation 4); c applies certain provisions of the Food Safety (Northern Ireland) Order 1991 (1991 N.I. 7) to the Regulations with modifications. This includes the application (with modifications) of — i Article 8, enabling an authorised officer, if it appears to that officer that Article 6(2) of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283 is being or has been contravened, to give notice to the person in charge of the food that it is not to be used for human consumption or is not to be removed except to some place specified in the notice, or to seize the food in order to have it dealt with by a justice of the peace (regulation 5(2) and Schedule 2), and ii Article 9(1), enabling an improvement notice to be served requiring compliance with the provisions of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283 specified in Schedule 1 to these Regulations. The provisions as applied, make the failure to comply with an improvement notice an offence (regulation 5(1) and Schedule 2); d revoke and replace the Novel Foods and Novel Foods Ingredients Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2004 and the Food Enzymes Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2009.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same 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