UK Offence Report

Offence: failure to comply with an enforcement requirement

regulation 5(1) of The Environmental Protection (Single-use Vapes) (England) 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 A person who without reasonable excuse—

a fails to comply with any requirement imposed in the exercise of an enforcement officer’s powers under regulation 10(1)(c)(iii) or (g), or

b otherwise obstructs an enforcement officer in the exercise of the officer’s powers under regulation 10, 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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
obstructing an official exercising a power
Fault element
Strict liability
Burden of proof
An element of the offence, for the prosecution to prove

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.

“Without reasonable excuse” here is an element of the offence rather than a defence, so its absence is for the prosecution to prove (R v Charles [2009] EWCA Crim 1570).

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision; qualified by reasonable excuse (an element; prosecution disproves once raised).

The defence, as drafted

1 A person who without reasonable excuse— a fails to comply with any requirement imposed in the exercise of an enforcement officer’s powers under regulation 10(1)(c)(iii) or (g), or b otherwise obstructs an enforcement officer in the exercise of the officer’s powers under regulation 10, is guilty of

What would breach regulation 5(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. Refusing to let an inspector onto premises they are entitled to enter under the Environmental Protection (Single-use Vapes) (England) Regulations 2024.
  2. Sending an official away, or telling staff to say nothing, where the power being exercised does not depend on anyone's consent.
  3. Physically blocking an examination, or removing something an officer has said they intend to inspect.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
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
25 November 2024
In force from
1 June 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, which apply in relation to England, prohibit the supply of single-use vapes. Part 2 prohibits the supply, offer for supply or possession for supply of single-use vapes. Breach of these prohibitions is an offence (regulation 4), subject to the mutual recognition principle in the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 (c. 27) where applicable. A civil sanctions regime enables regulators to impose a range of civil sanctions (regulation 9 and the Schedule). These are fixed monetary penalties, compliance notices, stop notices and enforcement undertakings. The Regulations make provision for the procedure relating to these sanctions and the available appeal mechanisms. Failure to comply with a stop notice is an offence (paragraph 16 of the Schedule). All appeals relating to a civil sanction are to the First-tier Tribunal. Regulations 8 and 10 provide for enforcement officers to have powers of entry to carry out the necessary investigations in order to determine whether an offence has been committed. Regulation 11 provides for the Secretary of State to give a direction for the disposal or other treatment of single-use vapes in respect of which an offence has been committed. Regulation 12 provides for publication of information on enforcement action taken by regulators. Regulation 13 provides that guidance relating to the use of civil sanctions must be prepared and consulted on, and specifies information to be included in such guidance. Regulation 14 contains provision for review of the Regulations. Regulators are able to recover the costs of enforcement (paragraph 27 of the Schedule) in the case of compliance notices and stop notices and must issue guidance about their use of enforcement cost recovery notices. A full impact assessment of the effect that these Regulations will have on the costs of business, the voluntary sector and the public sector is available from www.legislation.gov.uk, and from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Seacole Building, 2 Marsham Street, London, SW1P 4DF.

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