UK Offence Report

1 The master of a ship who fails to comply with any provision of regulation 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 or of…

regulation 13(1) of The Merchant Shipping (Returns of Births and Deaths) 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

1 The master of a ship who fails to comply with any provision of regulation 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 or of regulation 2, 3, 5 or 6 as extended by regulation 12 shall be guilty of an offence.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 master
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 master 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 13(1)?

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 master fails to comply with any provision of regulation 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 or of regulation 2, 3, 5 or 6 as extended by regulation 12.
  2. Not doing what the provision requires under the Merchant Shipping (Returns of Births and Deaths) Regulations 1979, 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
£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
3 December 1979
In force from
1 January 1980
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 revoke and re-enact the provisions of the Merchant Shipping (Returns of Births and Deaths) Regulations 1972 and, in addition— 1 where a master is unable to perform the duty imposed on him by regulation 3 because he has himself died or is incapacitated or missing, and the death in question has been established as mentioned in regulation 7, the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen (“the RGSS”) is required to record the information specified in Schedule 2 about the death (regulation 7); 2 where an inquest has been held, or there has been a post-mortem examination (or a preliminary investigation) and the coroner is satisfied that an inquest is unnecessary, and it appears to the coroner that the death occurred in a UK registered ship or in an unregistered British ship or, if outside the United Kingdom, was of a person employed in such a ship, the coroner is required to send the particulars specified in Schedule 3 to the RGSS (regulation 8); 3 a certified copy of the above-mentioned record or return has then to be sent by the RGSS to the appropriate Registrar General specified in regulation 11 (regulation 9); 4 the maximum penalty which can be imposed on any master who fails to make any return of birth or death required by the Regulations is increased to £50 (regulation 13(2)).

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