UK Offence Report

Offences and penalties

regulation 21(2) of The Common Agricultural Policy (Wine) Regulations 1993

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

2 If any person– a contravenes, or fails to comply with, any of the relevant Community provisions referred to in Columns 1 or 2 of Parts IV, VI, VII or VIII of Schedule 2, or b discloses to any other person any information obtained by him in pursuance of his duties under these Regulations, unless the disclosure is made in, or for the purposes of, the performance by him or any other person of any functions under these Regulations, or in pursuance of a Community obligation, he shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction in Great Britain to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale or on such conviction in Northern Ireland to a fine not exceeding £1,000.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
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 21(2)?

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. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Common Agricultural Policy (Wine) Regulations 1993, whatever the reason for doing it.
  2. Where the requirement is a positive duty, letting the time for performing it pass without performing it.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Either way — magistrates’ court or Crown Court
Maximum fine
£2,500
Standard scale
Level 4
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
Revoked
Revoked by
The Common Agricultural Policy (Wine) Regulations 1994
Revoked on
1 April 1994
Made
4 March 1993
In force from
1 April 1993
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, which apply throughout the United Kingdom and come into force on 1993, provide for the enforcement of EEC Regulations (as specified in Schedules 1 and 2) concerned with the production and marketing of wine and related products. They revoke and re-enact with amendments the provisions of the Common Agricultural Policy (Wine) Regulations 1992 (S.I. 1992/672), as amended by S.I. 1992/937. In addition to drafting amendments, the Regulations make the following changes of substance– a an authorised officer is expressly permitted to retain any record, register or document required as evidence in legal proceedings (regulation 8(2)(c)); b the defence of due diligence applies to specified offences (regulation 25); and c provision is made for the enforcement of the relevant Community provisions prohibiting the new planting of vines, on the production level in the United Kingdom exceeding 25,000 hectolitres per wine year (regulation 21(2)(a) and Schedule 2, Part IV, items 2 and 3). The Regulations– i designate competent authorities and a liaison authority for the purposes of enforcement (regulation 3); ii define “medium dry” for the purposes of labelling and description (regulation 4); iii specify conditions for the use of geographical ascriptions for the designation of table wine (regulation 5); iv exempt certain products from provisions relating to information required on labels (regulation 6); v permit the planting for certain purposes of vine varieties whose planting would otherwise be prohibited (regulation 7); vi provide for powers of inspection and enforcement (regulation 8); vii authorise controls on the movement of wine sector products (regulations 9 and 10); viii relieve authorised officers of personal liability for acts done by them in execution of the Regulations (regulation 11); ix confer on courts before which proceedings are brought powers in relation to the analysis and examination of samples (regulation 12); x describe Southern Counties and Northern Counties as the specified regions in the United Kingdom for producing quality wines psr (regulation 14); xi specify the list of vine varieties, minimum natural alcoholic strength, maximum yield per hectare, analytical test and an additional term of designation for use, in the production of quality wine psr and permit the production of such wine in areas of immediate proximity to the specified regions (regulations 15 to 20); and xii prescribe offences and penalties and provide defences (regulations 21 to 25). The Schedules have been revised and brought up to date so as to include references to relevant Regulations of the European Economic Community which have been adopted since the Common Agricultural Policy (Wine) Regulations 1992 came into force and to delete references to Regulations which have been repealed or superseded or have become redundant. In Schedule 1 each Regulation is given the title which appears in the Official Journal except in cases where the title refers to a Regulation that has been repealed or superseded. In such a case the title given in Schedule 1 refers to the superseding Regulation and the title in the Official Journal is given in a footnote.

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