UK Offence Report

Breach of the prohibition on the provision of a data reporting service

regulation 14(1) of The Data Reporting Services Regulations 2024

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 Unless paragraph (2) applies,

a person who breaches

a prohibition imposed by regulation 3(1) is guilty of 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
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 regulation 14(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. On these words an offence is committed where a person breaches a prohibition imposed by regulation 3(1).
  2. Doing what the provision prohibits, or failing to do what it requires under the Data Reporting Services Regulations 2024.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Either way — magistrates’ court or Crown Court
Maximum fine
Unlimited
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

expressed as the statutory maximum (the prescribed sum): the same words mean £5,000 in England and Wales and £10,000 in Scotland.

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
29 January 2024
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 Regulations) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

These Regulations restate with modifications the provisions of the Data Reporting Services Regulations 2017 (“the 2017 Regulations”) (S.I. 2017/699), with the broad exception of Part 3 of the 2017 Regulations referred to below. The 2017 Regulations made arrangements for the registration and supervision by the FCA of data reporting service providers. They are retained EU law and are revoked by section 1(1) of, and Schedule 1 to, the Financial Services and Markets Act 2023 (c. 29). Certain of the revoked provisions are being replaced in rules made by the Financial Conduct Authority under section 300H of FSMA 2000 (“data reporting service rules” as defined in regulation 2). These relate principally to operating requirements for authorised or verified persons, for which Part 3 of the 2017 Regulations had made provision. Corresponding modifications to these Regulations include— in Part 3, references to a requirement imposed by or under these Regulations includes data reporting service rules (regulation 2(4)); applicants for authorisation to provide a data reporting service or for verification of compliance with these Regulations must demonstrate compliance with the data reporting service rules (regulations 5, 7 and 8); an authorisation or verification may be cancelled where data reporting service rules have been contravened (regulations 7 and 10); an authorisation or verification may be subject to the imposition of restrictions where data reporting service rules are contravened (regulation 13). Chapter 2 of Part 3 (Application of FSMA 2000 for the purposes of the Regulations) and Part 5 (amendment of assimilated legislation) now include modifications and amendments relating to data reporting service rules. Other modifications include— arrangements for the provision of a CTP service to be put out to tender by the FCA, following which the service concerned may not be provided by anyone other than a person to whom the tender contract is awarded (regulation 6). The FCA has discretion to cancel an existing authorisation or verification where a person providing the service concerned is not awarded the tender contract (regulation 7(7) and 10(1)(b)); some administrative and enforcement arrangements for which Part 4 of the 2017 Regulations had made provision are now restated by applying equivalent provisions under FSMA 2000 with appropriate modifications; these include the FCA’s general duties (regulation 15), provision for supervision, monitoring and enforcement (regulation 16), disciplinary measures (regulation 19), the offence of misleading the FCA (regulation 24(3)) and the application of powers to formerly authorised persons (regulation 26). A de minimis impact assessment of the effect of this instrument is available from HM Treasury, 1 Horse Guards Road, London, SW1A 2HQ and is published with the Explanatory Memorandum alongside this instrument at www.legislation.gov.uk.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

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