UK Offence Report

Application of the 1983 Act

regulation 5A(3) of The Health Board Elections (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2010

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

3 Section 61 (other voting offences) of the 1983 Act applies to

a Health Board election with the following modifications—

a omit subsections(1), (2A), (3), (3A), (4), (6A) and (6B);

b for subsection(2) substitute—

2 A person shall be guilty of an offence if that person votes either—

a more than once in the same Health Board area; or

b in more than one Health Board area. ;

c for subsection(6) substitute—

6 For the purposes of this section

a person who has marked, whether validly or not, and returned

a ballot paper issued for the purpose of voting by post, shall be deemed to have voted. ; and

d in subsection(7)(a) for “below” substitute “as applied to

a Health Board election by the Health Board Elections (Scotland) Regulations 2009”.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 regulation 5A(3)?

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 votes either— a more than once in the same Health Board area.
  2. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Health Board Elections (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2010.

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
11 February 2010
In force from
15 February 2010
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 amend the Health Board Elections (Scotland) Regulations 2009 (“the principal Regulations”) which set out the arrangements for pilot Health Board elections. Regulation2(2) inserts regulation5A into the principal Regulations, which applies modified provisions of the Representation of the People Act 1983 to Health Board elections. These are section60 (presentation), section61 (voting more than once) and section65 (offences relating to nomination and ballot papers). Regulation2(4) amends rule5 of the Schedule to the principal Regulations to provide that an individual may not vote in more than oneHealth Board area and may not vote more than once in the same Health Board area.

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