UK Offence Report

Contravention of The Animal By-Products (Identification) Amendment (Scotland) Regulations 2002

the instrument as a whole of The Animal By-Products (Identification) Amendment (Scotland) Regulations 2002

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

Contravening this instrument is an offence under sections 10(2), 33 and 35 of the Food Safety Act 1990. The instrument itself contains no offence-creating words.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
Not determined

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.

Classifier’s reasoning: contravention offences of this kind are strict as to the breach; the fault position is governed by the parent Act and was not read from it.

What would breach the instrument as a whole?

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 what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Animal By-Products (Identification) Amendment (Scotland) Regulations 2002.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Set by another provision — the instrument states the penalty by reference to an Act or to another regulation
Maximum fine
Not determined
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

The instrument does not state a penalty itself. It sets one by reference to sections 10(2), 33 and 35 of the Food Safety Act 1990.

the penalty is in the parent Act, not in this instrument.

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
7 June 2002
In force from
1 July 2002
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, which extend to Scotland only, amend the Animal By-Products (Identification) Regulations 1995. The substantive amendments made by these Regulations to the 1995 Regulations are as follows:– a in paragraph 1 of regulation 2 (interpretation)– the definition of the Animal By-Products Order is updated; the definition of “animal by-product premises” is amended to exclude cold stores and cutting premises; the definition of “game processing facility” is amended to exclude cold stores and cutting premises; the definition of “occupier” is extended to include the occupier of a cold store or cutting premises; the definition of “specified bovine offal” is removed; the definition of “stained” is amended so as to provide that, in the case of animal by-products comprising entire poultry carcases, it means that the stain solution has been applied after the surface of the carcase has been opened by multiple and deep incisions; and definitions are inserted of the phrases “cold store”, “cutting premises” and “slaughterhouse” (regulation 2(2)); b regulation 4 (scope) is replaced with a provision which provides that the only whole carcases which have to be sterilised or stained are whole poultry carcases which are dead on arrival at a slaughterhouse or which are rejected following pre-slaughter or post-mortem health inspections carried out at such premises (regulation 2(3)); c the exemption from the application of the Regulations which was contained in regulation 5(1)(f) in favour of specified bovine offal is extended to cover specified risk material controlled by the TSE (Scotland) Regulations 2002 (regulation 2(4)(a)); d the exemption from the application of the Regulations which is contained in regulation 5(2)(a) and which operates in favour of poultry by-products is removed (regulation 2(4)(b)); e the exemption from the application of the Regulations which is contained in regulation 5(2)(c) and which operates in favour of the removal of green offal from animal by-products premises, game processing facilities and slaughterhouses is extended to apply also in favour of cold stores and cutting premises (regulation 2(4)(c)); f references to the Animal By-Products Order are amended to refer to the new definition (regulation 2(4)(d)); g regulation 6 (which currently imposes requirements with respect to the sterilisation and staining of animal by-products in slaughterhouses and game processing facilities only) is replaced with a provision which applies also in relation to cold stores and cutting premises (regulation 2(5)); h regulation 8 (which currently imposes requirements in relation to freezing animal by-products in animal by-products premises, game processing facilities and slaughterhouses only) is replaced with a provision which applies also in relation to cold stores and cutting premises (regulation 2(6)); i regulation 9 (which currently imposes requirements in relation to the storage and packaging of animal by-products) is replaced with a provision which imposes requirements with respect to the storage of unsterilised animal by products in the same room as products intended for human consumption and in cold stores, cutting premises, game processing facilities and slaughterhouses (regulation 2(7)); and j regulation 10 (which currently imposes restrictions on the movement of animal by-products from animal by-products premises, game processing facilities and slaughterhouses only) is replaced with a provision which applies also in relation to cold stores and cutting premises (regulation 2(8)). A Regulatory Impact Assessment, which includes a compliance cost assessment of the effects which these Regulations would have on business costs, has been prepared in respect of these Regulations and a copy of it has been placed in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre. Copies can be obtained from the Meat Policy Branch of the Food Standards Agency Scotland, 6th floor, St Magnus House, 25 Guild Street, Aberdeen AB11 6NJ.

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 0.70.

Basis
the penalty comes from the enabling Act rather than from this instrument
Confidence
0.70 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