UK Offence Report

Offences and Penalties

regulation 4(1) of The Motor Vehicles (Refilling of Air Conditioning Systems by Service Providers) Regulations 2009

This offence was read from the text as made, and no revised version was available, so a later revocation could not be ruled out. Check the current text at legislation.gov.uk.

What the provision says

1 If a person contravenes a regulation specified in paragraph (2), that person commits 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 person
Conduct
contravening a requirement of the instrument
Fault element
Strict liability
Burden of proof
Legal burden on the defendant

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 gives a defence the defendant must prove, on the balance of probabilities. A legal burden of that kind can be read down to a merely evidential one under section 3 of the Human Rights Act 1998 where placing it on the defendant would be disproportionate (R v Lambert [2001] UKHL 37; Sheldrake v DPP [2004] UKHL 43).

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision; other provisions of the same instrument use a mens rea word while this one does not (the Cundy v Le Cocq contrast).

The defence, as drafted

t shall be a defence for that person to show that he or she took all reasonable steps and exercised all due diligence to avoid committing the offence. 2 Where in any proceedings against any person for such an offence the defence provided by paragraph (1) above involves an allegation that the commission of the offence was due to— a the act or default of another; or b reliance

What would breach regulation 4(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. Doing the thing the provision prohibits under the Motor Vehicles (Refilling of Air Conditioning Systems by Service Providers) Regulations 2009, 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
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£1,000
Standard scale
Level 3
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
Status not determined
Made
9 August 2009
In force from
7 September 2009
Extent
Not stated

How this was established: read from the text as made; no revised version available, so later revocation could not be ruled out.

What the instrument is for

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

These Regulations implement Article 6(3) of Council Directive 2006/40/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 May 2006 (OJ No. L161, 14.6.2006, p.12) relating to emissions from air conditioning systems in motor vehicles and amending Council Directive 70/156/EEC (OJ No. 42, 23.2.1970, p.1 as last amended by OJ No. L161, 22.6.2007, p.60). Regulations 1 and 2 provides for general preliminary matters. Regulation 3 provides that the service provider must not fill an air conditioning system with fluorinated greenhouse gases where there has been an abnormal leak of refrigerant and that leak has not yet been repaired. Regulation 4 makes it a criminal offence for a service provider to fill an air conditioning system with fluorinated greenhouse gases where an abnormal leak has occurred and the necessary repairs have not been completed. It also makes it a criminal offence to obstruct an officer or make false statements to that officer, and for a person to claim they are acting as an officer when they do not have the authority to do so. Regulation 5 contains a defence on which a person may rely in certain circumstances. The burden of proof is on the defendant to show that he took all reasonable steps and exercised all due diligence to avoid committing the offence. Regulation 6 extends the liability to other parties where they have committed some act or default that resulted in the principal offender committing an offence under these Regulations. Regulation 7 makes it an offence to obstruct or provide false statements to an officer acting in pursuance of these Regulations. Regulation 8 provides an officer with powers to search premises and seize certain items and records in order to gather evidence that an offence has been committed. Regulation 9 contains provisions for appeal against the detention of equipment and records. Regulation 10 makes the enforcement authority liable to pay compensation where equipment or records are seized or detained without reasonable cause. Regulation 11 allows the enforcement authority to recover expenses following a successful conviction. Regulations 12 and 13 make savings for certain privileges and civil rights. A transposition note setting out how these Regulations transpose the provisions of Directive 2006/40/EC is available from the Department for Transport, Great Minster House, 76 Marsham Street, London, SW1P 4DR and is annexed to the Explanatory Memorandum which is available alongside this instrument on the OPSI website ( www.opsi.gov.uk). An impact assessment has not been produced for this instrument as no impact on the private or voluntary sectors is foreseen. A copy of Directive 2006/40/EC may be obtained from the Stationery Office (www.tso.co.uk) or from the EUROPA website (http://eur-lex.europa.eu/en/index.htm).

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 “commits 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