UK Offence Report

Contravention of The Cattle Passports Order 1996

the instrument as a whole of The Cattle Passports Order 1996

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

Contravening this instrument is an offence under section

73 of the Animal Health Act 1981. The instrument itself contains no offence-creating words.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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

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.

Classifier’s reasoning: contravention offences of this kind are strict as to the breach; the fault position is governed by the parent Act and was not read from it.

What would breach the instrument as a whole?

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. Moving the goods across the border under the Cattle Passports Order 1996 without the licence the instrument requires.
  2. Holding a licence for one consignment and using it for another.
  3. Sending goods in transit through the United Kingdom, where the provision catches transit as well as import and export.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Set by another provision — the instrument states the penalty by reference to an Act or to another regulation
Maximum fine
Not determined
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

The instrument does not state a penalty itself. It sets one by reference to section 73 of the Animal Health Act 1981.

the penalty is in the parent Act, not in this instrument.

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
Revoked
Revoked by
The Cattle Identification Regulations 1998
Revoked on
15 April 1998
Made
28 June 1996
In force from
1 July 1996
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 Order) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

This Order establishes a system of movement documents for cattle (“cattle passports”) for cattle born in Great Britain after the date of coming into force of this Order or imported after that date, and establishes the form of those passports (article 2 and the Schedule). It prohibits the movement of cattle on or off holdings without a cattle passport, subject to exceptions for young calves and imported cattle (articles 3 to 5). It establishes how to apply for a cattle passport (article 6) and sets out when particulars in the passport must be completed (articles 7 to 9). It makes provisions concerning passports for slaughterhouses, knackers' yards and hunt kennels (article 10). It provides for the retention of passports (article 11) change of ear tag numbers (article 12) and for lost passports (article 13). It provides for the surrender of passports when cattle are exported (article 14), and animal deaths where the animal is not subsequently taken to a slaughterhouse, knackers' yard or hunt kennel (article 15). It contains provisions on late applications (article 16). It amends the Bovine Animals (Records, Identification and Movement) Order 1995 so as to control the number of times calves under 12 weeks old can be taken to market in any period of 28 days, and to permit bovine animals to have two tags, one on each ear, bearing the number approved under that Order (article 17). It is enforced by the appropriate Minister and by the local authority (article 18). Breach of the Order is an offence under section 73 of the Animal Health Act 1981. A Compliance Cost Assessment has been prepared and placed in the library of each House of Parliament. Copies can be obtained from the Animal Health (Disease Control) Division of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Government Buildings, Hook Rise South, Tolworth, Surbiton, Surrey KT6 7NF.

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 0.55.

Basis
the penalty comes from the enabling Act rather than from this instrument
Confidence
0.55 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