UK Offence Report

Offence in relation to the UK(NI) indication

paragraph 24(4) of SCHEDULE 2 of The Product Safety and Metrology etc. (Amendment etc.) (UK(NI) Indication) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020

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

4 It is an offence for any person to contravene or fail to comply with any requirement of

a withdrawal or recall notice that relates to the UK(NI) indication served on that person under these Regulations.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
failing to comply with a notice or direction
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 24(4) 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.

  1. On these words it is an offence to contravene or fail to comply with any requirement of a withdrawal or recall notice that relates to the UK(NI) indication served on that person under these Regulations.
  2. Being served with a notice under the Product Safety and Metrology etc. (Amendment etc.) (UK(NI) Indication) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020 and doing nothing by the date it specifies.
  3. Doing part of what the notice requires, where it required all of it.
  4. Disagreeing with the notice and ignoring it, rather than using whatever appeal the instrument provides.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
Unlimited
Standard scale
Level 5
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

level 5 is unlimited in England and Wales for offences committed on or after 12 March 2015 (LASPO 2012 s.85, S.I. 2015/664).

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
8 December 2020
In force from
Not determined
Extent
E+W+S

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.

The Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland in the withdrawal agreement (“the Protocol”) requires that the EU legislation listed in Annex 2 to that Protocol is implemented in Northern Ireland. It also requires that where bodies or authorities based in the United Kingdom are involved in assessments or authorisations and they undertake those assessments or authorisations for products placed on the market in Northern Ireland, any conformity or similar marking must be accompanied by the indication “UK(NI)”. Part 2 of these Regulations (regulation 3 and Schedule 1) set out the form of the UK(NI) indication. Part 3 of these Regulations (regulation 4 and Schedule 2) amends legislation that implements some of the EU legislation listed in Annex 2 to the Protocol, in respect of Northern Ireland to make clear when the UK(NI) indication must be affixed and how and where it must be affixed. It also provides for the penalty when the UK(NI) is not affixed or where it is incorrectly affixed. Part 4 of these Regulations (regulation 5 and Schedule 3) amends the Product Safety and Metrology etc. (Amendments etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 (S.I. 2019/696) (“the 2019 Regulations”), which themselves amend (with effect from IP completion day) a number of pieces of legislation with respect to Great Britain to address failures of retained EU law to operate effectively and other deficiencies arising from the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union. Part 4 of these Regulations is made in part in exercise of the powers conferred by section 8(1) of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (c.16) (in particular paragraphs (c), (d), (e) and (g) of section 8(2) and paragraph (a) of section 8(3) of that Act). The majority of the amendments made by the 2019 Regulations extend to Great Britain only (leaving the legislation amended by the 2019 Regulations as it is in respect of Northern Ireland, thereby implementing the legislation listed in Annex 2 to the Protocol). The amendments made by Part 4 of these Regulations similarly extend to Great Britain only. The deficiencies corrected by Part 4 include providing for the expiry of provisions that were introduced by the 2019 Regulations allowing unilateral recognition of products that meet EU requirements and changing the requirement as to where authorised representatives of manufacturers can be based. Parts 5 to 7 amend other pieces of legislation to make clear that from IP completion day authorised representatives must be based in the United Kingdom, with respect to any products placed on the market of Great Britain. The Protocol also provides that nothing in the Protocol prevents the United Kingdom from ensuring unfettered market access for goods moving from Northern Ireland to other parts of the United Kingdom’s internal market. Part 4 of these Regulations make provision for qualifying Northern Ireland goods to be able to be placed on the market of Great Britain. The analysis developed to inform this instrument demonstrated that there are limited/ negligible additional costs to business associated with the specific provisions made in this instrument. There is no, or no significant, impact on charities, voluntary bodies or the public sector.

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.

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 0.90.

Basis
the provision says “it is an offence”; the provision says an offence is committed “if” something happens
Confidence
0.90 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