Enforcement of maintenance order registered in United Kingdom court.

paragraph 8(3) of SCHEDULE 3 of The Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders (Hague Convention Countries) Order 1993

Revoked
Strict liability
Summary only
Housing, planning, heritage and land

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

3 Any person for the time being under an obligation to make payments in pursuance of
a registered order shall give notice of any change of address to the clerk of the registering court, and any person failing without reasonable excuse to give such
a notice shall be liable on summary conviction to
a fine not exceeding level
2 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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: 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 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

the clerk of the registering court, and any person failing without reasonable excuse to give such a notice shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 2 on the standard scale.

What would breach paragraph 8(3) of SCHEDULE 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.

Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders (Hague Convention Countries) Order 1993.

Penalty

Mode of trial: Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine: £500
Standard scale: Level 2
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.

Environmental offences: definitive guideline Magistrates' courts and the Crown Court in England and Wales · in force from 1 July 2014
Covers unauthorised or harmful deposit, treatment or disposal of waste, illegal discharges to air, land and water, and the equivalent offences committed by organisations. It is the guideline that introduced turnover bands for corporate fines, so the size of the defendant company is a starting point rather than a mitigating detail.
Reduction in sentence for a guilty plea: definitive guideline All courts in England and Wales · in force from 1 June 2017
The sliding scale of credit for pleading guilty, from one third at the first stage of proceedings downwards.
General guideline: overarching principles All courts in England and Wales · in force from 1 October 2019
The guideline a court uses when there is no offence-specific guideline, which is the position for the overwhelming majority of offences created by statutory instrument. It sets out how culpability and harm are assessed from first principles.
Totality: definitive guideline All courts in England and Wales
How to sentence more than one offence at once so that the total is just and proportionate - frequently in point here, because regulatory prosecutions commonly charge several breaches of the same instrument.

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 International Recovery of Maintenance (Hague Convention 2007 etc.) Regulations 2012
Made: 10 March 1993
In force from: 5 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 Order provides for the implementation in the United Kingdom of the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Decisions Relating to Maintenance Obligations concluded at The Hague on 2nd October 1973. It replaces and revokes an earlier order (the Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders (Hague Convention Countries) Order 1979 to similar effect. The differences between this Order and the 1979 Order reflect changes made in the domestic law in England and Wales, and Northern Ireland on maintenance since then, including the Children Act 1989 (c. 41), the Maintenance Enforcement Act 1991 (c. 17) and the Maintenance Orders (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act 1992 (c. 56). This Order applies the provisions of Part I of the Maintenance Orders (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act 1972, as amended, in relation to the Hague Convention countries listed in Schedule 1 as they apply in relation to a reciprocating country, subject to the exceptions, adaptations and modifications set out in Schedule 2 to the Order. Accordingly, Part I of the 1972 Act is to have effect as set out in Schedule 3 to the Order. The dates of the coming into force of the Hague Convention between the United Kingdom and the Hague Convention countries are as follows: Federal Republic of Germany (1st April 1987); Finland (1st July 1983); France (1st October 1977); Italy (1st January 1982); Luxembourg (1st June 1981); Netherlands (Kingdom in Europe and Netherlands Antilles (1st March 1981); Norway (1st July 1978); Portugal (1st August 1976); Slovakia (until 1st January 1993 part of the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic) (1st August 1976); Sweden (1st May 1977); Switzerland (1st August 1976); The Czech Republic (until 1st January 1993 part of the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic) (1st August 1976); and Turkey (1st November 1983). The Order comes into force on 5th April 1993.

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 0.72.

Basis: the provision states liability on summary conviction; the provision states a penalty in older drafting
Confidence: 0.72 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

This provision on legislation.gov.uk The authoritative text. Check it before relying on anything here.
The Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders (Hague Convention Countries) Order 1993 Every offence this instrument creates, and its explanatory note
Housing, planning, heritage and landOther offences on the same subject
Offences created in 1993