UK Offence Report

Prohibition on importation of Peruvian food

regulation 2(3) of The Imported Food (Peruvian Foodstuffs) Regulations 1991

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

3 Any person who imports into Great Britain any food in contravention of paragraph (1) of this regulation shall be guilty of an offence triable summarily and liable on conviction to imprisonment for

a period not exceeding three months or to

a fine not exceeding level

5 on the standard scale or to 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
importing or exporting without authority
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 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.

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 2(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 imports into Great Britain any food in contravention of paragraph (1) of this regulation.
  2. Moving the goods across the border under the Imported Food (Peruvian Foodstuffs) Regulations 1991 without the licence the instrument requires.
  3. Holding a licence for one consignment and using it for another.
  4. Sending goods in transit through the United Kingdom, where the provision catches transit as well as import and export.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Not determined
Maximum fine
£2,000
Standard scale
Level 5
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

this is the level 5 value when the instrument came into force (1991-03-01); the standard scale is keyed to the date the offence was committed, and for conduct today the same words mean an unlimited fine.

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
Revoked
Revoked by
The Imported Food and Feedingstuffs (Safeguards against Cholera) Regulations 1991
Revoked on
5 November 1991
Made
28 February 1991
In force from
1 March 1991
Extent
Not stated

How this was established: the instrument was revoked by a later instrument found in this corpus.

What the instrument is for

(This note is not part of the Regulations) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

These Regulations prohibit the importation into Great Britain of Peruvian food, (regulation 2(1)) exceptions to the prohibition are provided (regulation 2(2) and Schedules 1 and 2). The provisions of the Food Safety Act 1990 relating to the commission of offences by corporations, or as a result of another person’s fault, documentary evidence and the defence of due diligence, are applied to the offence of importing Peruvian food in breach of the Regulations (regulations 2(3) and 3). The Regulations are to be enforced by specified food authorities, port health authorities and port local authorities (regulation 4).

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”
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