UK Offence Report

Protection from disclosure

regulation 9(c) of The Companies and Limited Liability Partnerships (Protection and Disclosure of Information and Consequential Amendments) 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

c after paragraph (2) insert—

3 Section 790ZH applies to LLPs, modified so that it reads as follows— Offence of failing to comply with protection of secured information provisions 790ZH

1 If an LLP contravenes

a restriction on the use or disclosure of information imposed under Part

7 of the Register of People with Significant Control Regulations 2016 (S.I. 2016/339), as that Part is applied to LLPs by regulation

4 of, and Schedule

2 to, the Limited Liability Partnerships (Register of People with Significant Control) Regulations 2016 (S.I. 2016/340), an offence is committed by—

a the LLP, and

b every designated member of the LLP who is in default.

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 This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.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
contravening a requirement of the instrument
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 9(c)?

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 the thing the provision prohibits under the Companies and Limited Liability Partnerships (Protection and Disclosure of Information and Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2024, whatever the reason for doing it.
  2. Where the requirement is a positive duty, letting the time for performing it pass without performing it.

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
19 December 2024
In force from
27 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.

The Companies (Disclosure of Address) Regulations 2009 (S.I. 2009/214) (“the 2009 Regulations”) make provision for applications to the registrar of companies under section 1088 of the Companies Act 2006 (c. 46) (“the 2006 Act”) for addresses on the register to be made unavailable for public inspection. Part 2 of these Regulations amends provisions of the 2009 Regulations. Regulation 3 introduces additional circumstances where an individual whose usual residential address is on the register may make an application for that address to be made unavailable for public inspection and makes provision for the registrar to disclose a usual residential address which has been made unavailable for public inspection in certain circumstances relating to the restoration of a dissolved company. The Limited Liability Partnerships Act 2000 (c. 12) provides for the creation of limited liability partnerships (“LLPs”) and for the making of regulations concerning them. Part 3 of these Regulations amends provisions of the Limited Liability Partnerships (Application of Companies Act 2006) Regulations 2009 (S.I. 2009/1804), including to apply the provisions of regulation 3 to LLPs with modifications. Part 4 amends the Limited Liability Partnerships (Register of People with Significant Control) Regulations 2016 (S.I. 2016/340) to make changes which are consequential on the reform of certain company law provisions by the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 (c. 56). A full Impact Assessment has not been prepared for this instrument as no, or no significant, impact on the private, voluntary or public sector is foreseen.

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 0.55.

Basis
c06_offence_committed
Confidence
0.55 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