UK Offence Report

3 A person who without reasonable excuse contravenes any of the foregoing provisions of this regulation…

regulation 8(3) of The Hops Certification Regulations 1979

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 A person who without reasonable excuse contravenes any of the foregoing provisions of this regulation shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction or, in Scotland, on conviction before

a court of summary jurisdiction, to

a fine not exceeding £50.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
An element of the offence, for the prosecution to prove

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.

“Without reasonable excuse” here is an element of the offence rather than a defence, so its absence is for the prosecution to prove (R v Charles [2009] EWCA Crim 1570).

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision; qualified by reasonable excuse (an element; prosecution disproves once raised); other provisions of the same instrument use a mens rea word while this one does not (the Cundy v Le Cocq contrast).

The defence, as drafted

3 A person who without reasonable excuse contravenes any of the foregoing provisions of this regulation shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction or, in Scotland, on conviction before a court of summary jurisdiction, to a fine not exceeding £50.

What would breach regulation 8(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 without reasonable excuse contravenes any of the foregoing provisions of this regulation.
  2. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Hops Certification Regulations 1979, whatever the reason for doing it.
  3. Where the requirement is a positive duty, letting the time for performing it pass without performing it.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£50
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

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
29 August 1979
In force from
1 October 1979
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 implementation in the United Kingdom of the Community hop certification system set up under the Community provisions referred to in regulation 1(2). Regulation 2 provides for certification to be carried out by certifying officers authorised for that purpose by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food or the Secretary of State. Regulation 3 creates offences of selling uncertified or improperly packaged hops or hop products of Community origin; selling imported third country hop cones without an attestation of equivalence or control attestation; selling imported third country hop products without an attestation of equivalence; and, except in the case of hops harvested on land owned by a brewer and used by him, using for the manufacture of hop products third country hops imported without an attestation of equivalence. Regulation 4 imposes restrictions on the movement of third country hop cones imported without an attestation of equivalence. Regulation 5 provides for inspection of certification centres and premises where hops and hop products are to be found and regulation 6 makes it an offence to obstruct an inspector. Regulation 7 provides for the submission of brewers' and processors' declarations and regulation 8 for the keeping and production of records. Regulation 9 creates offences of removing, falsifying, etc. marks or certificates and making or using false entries in records. Regulation 10 provides for defences; regulations 11 and 12 are supplementary. Regulation 13 repeals the Hop Trade Act 1814 and the Hop (Prevention of Frauds) Act 1866 and revokes the Hops (Import Regulation) Order 1961.

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