UK Offence Report

4 It is an offence to fail to comply with paragraph (3).

regulation 11(4) of The Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Enforcement 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

4 It is an offence to fail to comply with paragraph (3).

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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 do something the instrument requires
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 11(4)?

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 fail to comply with paragraph (3).
  2. Not doing what the provision requires under the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Enforcement Regulations 2024, by the time it requires it to be done.
  3. Doing it, but not in the manner or to the standard the instrument specifies.

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
11 November 2024
In force from
1 January 2025
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 supplement the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Act 2024 (c. 11) (“the Act”) by making provision in relation to the enforcement of section 1 of the Act. Part 2 contains provisions relating to enforcement. It provides that the Regulations are to be enforced by the enforcement authorities (regulation 4). It confers powers on inspectors appointed by an enforcement authority in relation to the enforcement of the Act and these Regulations. The powers include provision to issue a hold notice (regulation 5), and powers of entry and seizure (regulations 9 and 10). The appropriate authority (the Secretary of State, the Scottish Ministers or the Welsh Ministers) may also revoke or suspend certain approvals, authorisations and certificates which it has issued, in circumstances where any provision of the Act or these Regulations has not been complied with (regulation 7). Schedule 1 provides an appeal procedure for such suspensions or revocations. Regulations 11 and 12 make provision about the keeping of records by anyone exporting relevant livestock from Great Britain, and the production of records to inspectors for the purposes of investigating offences under section 1 of the Act or these Regulations. Regulations 17 and 18 provide time limits for bringing prosecutions and regulation 19 provides that the Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (“HMRC”) may disclose information to the enforcement authorities for the purposes of the Regulations. It is an offence for a person who has received information from HMRC to disclose it to another person if the data relates to an identifiable person. Failure to comply with a hold notice, failure to keep records and obstructing inspectors are also offences under the Regulations. An offence is punishable by a fine (regulation 15). Part 3 contains provisions on the service of notices (regulation 20) and transitional provision (regulation 22). It also introduces Schedule 2 (regulation 21), which contains consequential and supplementary amendments to related legislation. A full impact assessment has not been produced for this instrument as no, or no significant, impact on the private, voluntary or public sector is foreseen. A full impact assessment has been published in relation to the Act and copies can be obtained from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs at 2 Marsham Street, London, SW1P 4DF or at the website of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs at www.gov.uk/defra.

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 0.90.

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