UK Offence Report

Offences and penalties

regulation 34(1) of The Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 1997

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

1 Subject to paragraph

5 of Schedule 8,

a producer who contravenes

a requirement of—

a subject to paragraph (2) below, regulation 3(5)(a);

b regulation 3(5)(b)(i); or

c regulation 3(5)(b)(ii), is guilty of an offence.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 producer
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 producer 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 34(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 a producer contravenes a requirement of— a subject to paragraph (2) below, regulation 3(5)(a); b regulation 3(5)(b)(i); or c regulation 3(5)(b)(ii).
  2. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 1997, whatever the reason for doing it.
  3. 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
£5,000
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

expressed as the statutory maximum (the prescribed sum): the same words mean £5,000 in England and Wales and £10,000 in Scotland.

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 Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2005 (revoked)
Made
5 March 1997
In force from
6 March 1997
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 impose on producers obligations to recover and recycle packaging waste, and related obligations, in order to attain the targets in article 6(1) of Directive 94/62/EC. A producer (defined in regulation 3) who in a year (“a relevant year”) has a specified level of turnover (set out in Schedule 1) and handles (as defined in Schedule 1) packaging or packaging materials (defined in regulation 2) weighing more than 50 tonnes has an obligation in the following year to recover and to recycle packaging waste, as set out in Schedule 2 (“the individual route”). These obligations will apply from the year 1998, except in relation to wholesalers to whom they will only apply from the year 2000. Certain categories of producer are excluded by regulation 4. In particular, a producer who joins a scheme which undertakes to meet the recovery and recycling targets of all its members is not required to comply with its obligations. In such cases the obligations are performed through the scheme. There are special provisions for groups of companies (regulation 29 and Schedule 8) and special producers (regulation 4 and Schedule 3 Parts III to V). “Packaging”, “packaging waste”, “recovery”, “recycling” and “reuse” are defined as in Directive 94/62/EC. Under regulation 5 producers who are not members of registered schemes need to be registered with the Environment Agency or, in Scotland, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency. The producer applies in accordance with regulation 6 and must supply, in particular, the information set out in Parts I and II of Schedule 4. The Agency will normally require the applicant to undertake to inform the Agency of material changes and to give the other undertakings mentioned in regulation 7. An applicant who complies with the relevant requirements (regulation 6(5)) will be registered. Registration will continue unless and until cancelled, but is subject to an updating of information before 1 April each year (regulation 8). There is provision for cancellation of registration where, for example, a producer fails to provide information (regulation 11(1)) or joins a registered scheme (regulation 11(2)). There are similar registration requirements for schemes in regulations 12 to 17. To be registered must have the approval of the Secretary of State and satisfy the requirements of competition scrutiny in regulation 31 (regulation 12(4)). Registered producers, and operators of schemes, are required to maintain records and furnish returns to the appropriate Agency (regulations 22 and 24). Registered producers are also to provide certificates of compliance with their recovery and recycling obligations (regulation 23). Regulations 25 and 26 set out the duties of the appropriate Agencies to monitor compliance and in relation to a public register. Regulations 27 and 28 concern the powers of the appropriate Agencies to approve persons to issue certificates of compliance and of entry and inspection. Regulations 32 and 33 exclude and modify the Restrictive Trade Practices Act 1976 respectively. Under regulation 34 it is an offence to contravene the producer responsibility obligations to register, recover and recycle packaging waste, and furnish a certificate of compliance to the appropriate Agency, or to provide false or misleading information, or to prevent the appropriate Agencies from exercising their powers of entry and inspection, or to fail to furnish information in connection with competition scrutiny. An assessment which shows the cost of compliance to businesses (a “compliance cost assessment”) in respect of these Regulations may be obtained from the Department of the Environment, Environment Business and Management Division, Branch EBM2, Room C9/02, 2 Marsham Street,London SW1P 3EB. A copy has been placed in the library of each of the Houses of Parliament.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

What Parliament said

Mentions of this instrument in Hansard. Parliamentary material is reused under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0.

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