Penalty for unauthorised person sitting or voting

Q: Is paragraph 54(1) of SCHEDULE 2 of The Turks and Caicos Islands Constitution Order 2011 a strict liability offence?

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.

paragraph 54(1) of SCHEDULE 2 of The Turks and Caicos Islands Constitution Order 2011

Revoked
Strict liability
Corporate, financial services, company law, employment, charity, electoral and tax

The provision has been revoked and no saving provision preserving liability for earlier conduct was found.

What the provision says

1 Any person who sits or votes in the House of Assembly knowing, or having reasonable grounds for believing, that he or she is not entitled to do so shall be liable to
a penalty not exceeding 1,000 United States dollars for each day on which he or she so sits or votes.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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: 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 paragraph 54(1) of SCHEDULE 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.

On these words an offence is committed where a person sits or votes in the House of Assembly knowing, or having reasonable grounds for believing, that he or she is not entitled to do so.
Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Turks and Caicos Islands Constitution Order 2011.

Penalty

Mode of trial: Not determined
Maximum fine: Not determined
Maximum prison (summary): Not determined

no penalty is stated in this instrument; it may be in the enabling Act, or in a general penalties provision this pass did not connect to the offence.

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.

Sentencing organisations: fines and the means of a corporate defendant All courts in England and Wales
How a fine on a company is arrived at from its turnover. Relevant far beyond the guidelines that state it, because a very large share of the offences in this corpus can only be committed by an organisation.
Fraud, bribery and money laundering offences: definitive guideline Magistrates' courts and the Crown Court in England and Wales · in force from 1 October 2014
Covers fraud, false accounting, bribery and money laundering, including offences committed by organisations.
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 Turks and Caicos Islands (Finance) Order 2017
Revoked on: 1 April 2017
Made: 13 July 2011
In force from: Not determined
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 establishes a new Constitution of the Turks and Caicos Islands. The new Constitution sets out a catalogue of fundamental rights and freedoms of the individual and provisions for their enforcement. It provides for a Governor as Her Majesty’s representative in the Islands, for a House of Assembly composed of elected and appointed members and the Attorney General, for a Cabinet and for Ministers appointed from among the elected or appointed members of the House. It also provides for the judiciary, the public service, and a number of institutions protecting good governance, notably an Integrity Commission, a Human Rights Commission, an Auditor General and a Director of Public Prosecutions. Provision is also made regarding Crown land and for public financial management, including the independent audit of public accounts. The Order revokes the Turks and Caicos Islands Constitution Order 2006, as well as two Orders in Council of 2009 and 2010 that modified and supplemented it, which together form the present Constitution of the Islands.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same instrument

Protection from arbitrary arrest or detentionparagraph 5(2) of SCHEDULE 2
Protection from arbitrary arrest or detentionparagraph 5(2)(e) of SCHEDULE 2

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 0.68.

Basis: the provision states a penalty in older drafting
Confidence: 0.68 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 Turks and Caicos Islands Constitution Order 2011 Every offence this instrument creates, and its explanatory note
Corporate, financial services, company law, employment, charity, electoral and taxOther offences on the same subject
Offences created in 2011