UK Offence Report

Offences and penalties

regulation 8(1) of The Electrical Luminous Tube Signs (Scotland) 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 owner or any occupier of premises where it is proposed to install apparatus who fails without reasonable excuse to ensure that it complies with regulation

3 shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to

a fine not exceeding level

3 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
an owner
Conduct
breaching the provision
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 an owner 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

remises where it is proposed to install apparatus who fails without reasonable excuse to ensure that it complies with regulation 3 shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.

What would breach regulation 8(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 an owner fails without reasonable excuse to ensure that it complies with regulation 3.
  2. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Electrical Luminous Tube Signs (Scotland) Regulations 1990.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£400
Standard scale
Level 3
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

this is the level 3 value when the instrument came into force (1990-07-01); the standard scale is keyed to the date the offence was committed, and for conduct today the same words mean £1000.

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
16 March 1990
In force from
1 July 1990
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, which apply only to Scotland, require electrical luminous tube signs, and any other similarly designed equipment or transformers required to raise the voltage of such signs and equipment, to be provided with cut-off switches for use by firefighters in the event of a fire. Regulations 3 and 4 require such cut-off switches to be suitably located and identified. Regulation 5 requires that a person proposing to install such apparatus shall give prior notice to the fire authority, showing where the emergency switch is to be located and how it is to be identified. The fire authority may serve a counter-notice prohibiting the use of apparatus where they consider it will be unsafe in the event of fire, and a person aggrieved by such a counter-notice may appeal to the sheriff. Regulation 6 exempts from the requirement signs installed on premises licensed under the Cinemas Act 1985. Regulation 8 creates offences for failure to comply with the requirements of the Regulations and prescribes a penalty not exceeding level 3 of the standard scale (currently £400) on summary conviction in respect of each offence.

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