UK Offence Report

Contravention of The Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) Order 2019

the instrument as a whole of The Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) Order 2019

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

Contravening this instrument is an offence under sections

5 and 17(4) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
breaching the provision
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. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) Order 2019.

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 sections 5 and 17(4) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984.

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
Status not determined
Made
3 September 2019
In force from
Not determined
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 Order) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

The Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) Order 2019, the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 2) Order 2019 and the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) Order 2019 enable the movement of cross-Channel lorries in Kent to be controlled by regulating access to the road network, conferring new powers on traffic officers to allow for such vehicles to be detected and directed, and making ancillary provision relating to enforcement. This Order: a makes access to the coastbound carriageway of the M20 Motorway between Junctions 9 and 13 (the primary route to the Channel Tunnel at Folkestone and the Port of Dover) conditional on producing border documents (to demonstrate readiness to bring goods into a foreign country) and displaying a permit (issued after using an approved route in Kent) (article 2); b prohibits cross-Channel lorries using a contraflow on the London-bound carriageway of the M20 Motorway between Junctions 8 and 9, which is reserved for other coastbound traffic (article 3(1) and (2)); c requires the drivers of cross-Channel lorries to display a permit before entering the M20 Motorway queueing area between Junctions 8 and 9 of the coastbound carriageway if the M26 Motorway is also being used as a queueing area (article 3(3) and (4)); d amends the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 to make evidence from prescribed devices relating to breaches of the new restrictions created by this Order and the No. 2 Order, or of a direction given by a traffic officer under the No. 1 Order, more readily admissible in court through the procedure established by section 20 of that Act (article 4(2)); e designates the offence created by article 2(6) of the No. 1 Order of failing to comply with a direction given, or requirement imposed, by a traffic officer as a fixed penalty and financial penalty deposit offence (article 4(3) and (4) and article 6); and f sets the fixed penalty amount for the new offence referred to immediately above and for breaches of the restrictions created by this Order and the No. 2 Order at £300 (article 5). The restrictions imposed by articles 2 and 3, which cannot have effect after 31st December 2020, are activated through the placing of traffic signs on the coastbound carriageway of the M20 Motorway between Junctions 7 and 8. This will also activate restrictions in the No. 2 Order affecting the local road network in Kent. This Order also provides for the issuing of permits to the drivers of heavy commercial vehicles and to hauliers established in Kent, which are required to establish some of the exceptions to the restrictions imposed by this Order and the No. 2 Order (article 7). A full Impact Assessment has not been produced for this instrument as it is not expected to have significant impact on the private, public or voluntary sectors. An Explanatory Memorandum has been prepared for this Order and is available alongside this instrument on the UK Legislation website www.legislation.gov.uk.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

How this became law

This instrument became law without a debate or a vote. Under the negative procedure it took effect unless a motion to stop it succeeded, and none was tabled.

Neither House could have amended it. A statutory instrument is put to each House as a whole thing, to be approved or not; the Houses can reject an instrument or record their regret, but they cannot change a word of it. That is the constitutional position for every offence on this site.

The full procedural history →

What Parliament said

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

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 0.59.

Basis
the penalty comes from the enabling Act rather than from this instrument
Confidence
0.59 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