UK Offence Report

Administrator’s duties on vacating office

rule 3.70(2) of The Insolvency (England and Wales) Rules 2016

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

2 An administrator who makes default in complying with this rule is guilty of an offence and liable to

a fine and, for continued contravention, to

a daily default fine.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 rule 3.70(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.

  1. On these words an offence is committed where a person makes default in complying with this rule.
  2. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Insolvency (England and Wales) Rules 2016.

Penalty

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

'to a fine' with no stated maximum.

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
18 October 2016
In force from
6 April 2017
Extent
E+W

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 Rules) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

These Rules set out the detailed procedures for the conduct of all company and personal insolvency proceedings in England and Wales under the Insolvency Act 1986 and otherwise give effect to that Act. These Rules supersede the Insolvency Rules 1986 (SI 1986/1925 as amended). Those Rules are revoked along with 29 amending Rules. These Rules give effect to amendments made to the Insolvency Act by the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2011 (c.24), the Deregulation Act 2015 (c.20) and the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act 2015 (c.26). The Introductory Rules (rules 1-7) contain the citation, commencement, extent and application of these Rules. The preliminary rules also introduce Schedule 1 (revocations), Schedule 2 (transitional and savings provisions) and Schedule 3 (punishment of offences). Rule 5 enables the Secretary of State to make regulations about the conduct of office holders in insolvency proceedings. Part 1 (rules 1.1 to 1.58) is a common part containing definitions and rules about the standard contents of documents, the delivery and service of documents and the use of websites. Part 2 (rules 2.1 to 2.45) contains rules about company voluntary arrangements. Part 3 (rules 3.1 to 3.70) contains rules about administration. Part 4 (rules 4.1 to 4.24) contains rules about receivership. Part 5 (rules 5.1 to 5.22) contains rules about members’ voluntary winding up. Part 6 (rules 6.1 to 6.48) contains rules about creditors’ voluntary winding up. Part 7 (rules 7.1 to 7.119) contains rules about winding up by the court. Part 8 (rules 8.1 to 8.38) contains rules about individual voluntary arrangements. Part 9 (rules 9.1 to 9.27) contains rules about debt relief orders. Part 10 (rules 10.1 to 10.171) contains rules about bankruptcy. Part 11 (rules 11.1 to 11.23) is a common part containing rules about bankruptcy and debt relief restrictions orders and undertakings and the insolvency registers. Part 12 (rules 12.1 to 12.65) is a common part containing rules about court procedure and practice. Part 13 (rules 13.1 to 13.5) contains rules about official receivers. Part 14 (rules 14.1 to 14.45) is a common part containing rules about claims by and distributions to creditors in administration, winding up and bankruptcy. Part 15 (rules 15.1 to 15.46) is a common part containing rules about decision making. Part 16 (rules 16.1 to 16.9) is a common part containing rules about proxies and corporate representation. Part 17 (rules 17.1 to 17.29) is a common part containing rules about creditors’ and liquidation committees. Part 18 (rules 18.1 to 18.38) is a common part containing rules about reporting and remuneration of office-holders. Part 19 (rules 19.1 to 19.11) is a common part containing rules about disclaimer in winding up and bankruptcy. Part 20 (rules 20.1 to 20.7) is a common part containing rules about debtors and their families who are at risk of violence and orders not to disclose a debtor’s current address. Part 21 (rules 21.1 to 21.8) contains rules which give effect to the Council Regulation No. 1346/2000 of 29 May 2000 on Insolvency Proceedings. Part 22 (rules 22.1 to 22.7) contains rules about obtaining permission to act as director of a company with a prohibited name. Preliminary rule 7 requires the Secretary of State to review the operation and effect of these Rules and publish a report within five years of their coming into force and within every five years after that. Following a review it will fall to the Secretary of State to consider whether these Rules should remain as they are, or be revoked or be amended. A further instrument would be needed to revoke these Rules or amend them. A full impact assessment of the effect that these Rules will have on the costs of business and the voluntary sector is available from The Insolvency Service, 4 Abbey Orchard Street, London SW2P 2HT and is published on The Insolvency Service website www.gov.uk/government/organisations/insolvency-service. It is also published with the Explanatory Memorandum alongside these Rules on www.legislation.gov.uk.

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