UK Offence Report

Removal, falsification, etc. of marks or certificates; false entries

regulation 9 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

9 If any person—

a without due authority and with intent to deceive, removes, alters, conceals or defaces any certificate, or any prescribed seal or mark, lawfully applied to, accompanying or relating to any hops or hop products;

b without due authority and with intent to deceive applies to any hops or hop products, any certificate or any prescribed seal or mark;

c with intent to deceive applies to any hops or hop products any document, seal or mark so closely resembling

a certificate or

a prescribed seal or mark as to be likely to deceive;

d knowingly makes

a false entry in any declaration, certificate, book, account or record which is required by the Community provisions or these regulations to be made, issued, kept or produced, or, with intent to deceive, makes use of any such entry knowing the entry to be false; he shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to

a fine not exceeding £400 or to imprisonment for

a term not exceeding three months or both.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
making a false or misleading statement
Fault element
Requires proof of a state of mind
Burden of proof
Legal burden on the defendant

The prosecution must prove both that the conduct happened and that it was done with the state of mind the provision names (knowingly, with intent to).

The provision gives a defence the defendant must prove, on the balance of probabilities. A legal burden of that kind can be read down to a merely evidential one under section 3 of the Human Rights Act 1998 where placing it on the defendant would be disproportionate (R v Lambert [2001] UKHL 37; Sheldrake v DPP [2004] UKHL 43).

Classifier’s reasoning: mens rea word in the offence-creating words: knowingly, with intent to.

The defence, as drafted

In any proceedings for an offence under these regulations, it shall be a defence for the person charged to prove that he took all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to avoid the commission of such an offence; and, without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing, if that person proves that he took all the precautions and exercised all the diligen

What would breach regulation 9?

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. Entering a figure on a form or return that is known to be wrong under the Hops Certification Regulations 1979.
  2. Leaving out something the form asks for, where the omission is what makes the answer misleading.
  3. Producing a document to an official that has been altered since it was issued.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£400
Maximum prison (summary)
3 months

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