UK Offence Report

1 Any person who without reasonable excuse contravenes or fails to comply with any of the provisions of…

regulation 7(1) of The Household Appliances (Noise Emission) Regulations 1990

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 Any person who without reasonable excuse contravenes or fails to comply with any of the provisions of regulation 3(1) or

a notice given under regulation 6(2) shall be guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction with

a fine not exceeding level five on the standard scale.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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

The defence, as drafted

1 Any person who without reasonable excuse contravenes or fails to comply with any of the provisions of regulation 3(1) or a notice given under regulation 6(2) shall be guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction with a fine not exceeding level five on the standard scale.

What would breach regulation 7(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 person without reasonable excuse contravenes or fails to comply with any of the provisions of regulation 3(1) or a notice given under regulation 6(2).
  2. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Household Appliances (Noise Emission) Regulations 1990, 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
Not determined
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

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
5 February 1990
In force from
28 February 1990
Extent
E+W+S

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 implement Council Directive 86/594/EEC on airborne noise emitted by household appliances. The Regulations prohibit on or after 28th February 1990 the marketing by a manufacturer or importer into the European Community of any household appliance in respect of which the manufacturer or importer has taken steps to inform any person to whom the appliance is to be, or may be, marketed o the level of airborne noise emitted by it unless the level is determined in accordance with article 6 of the Directive (regulations 3, 4 and 7). Harmonised standards prepared by the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) and the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardisation (CENELEC) are incorporated by national standards bodies into relevant national standards the reference numbers of which are published in each memberState (in the United Kingdom by the Secretary of State). The Regulations provide that where measurements for determining the level of airborne noise emitted by appliances have been carried out in accordance with the relevant national standard incorporating a harmonised standard or in so far as no armonised standard exists in accordance with the relevant national standard and technical regulations of member States the reference numbers of which have been published in the Official Journal of the European Communities there shall be a presumption that the stated level of airborne noise emittedby the appliance satisfies the requirements of the Regulations (regulation 5). The Regulations provide for periodic checks of appliances to be carried out by the Secretary of State in Great Britain to ensure compliance with the requirements of the Regulations or of the Directive as implemented in the law of Northern Ireland or of a member State other than the United Kingom. If such a check shows that the level of airborne noise emitted by the appliances and specified in the information mentioned in paragraph 1 above has not been determined in accordance with such requirements the Secretary of State may give notice of that fact to the manufacturer or importer. Thenotice will require the manufacturer or importer, unless he withdraws from the market all appliances specified in the notice, to rectify the information in respect of them (regulations 6 and 7).

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 0.92.

Basis
the provision says a person is “guilty of an offence”; the provision says the conduct is “punishable”
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