Criminal Liability in Regulatory Contexts Responses - Law ...

Trading Standards South East Ltd
1.748 TSSE completely disagrees with this proposal. Case law has indicated time and
time again that the decision to institute criminal proceedings is a matter for the
prosecutor. 21 The role of the Courts is not to interfere with that decision unless
such action is tantamount to an abuse of process, and, inconsistent with a
published enforcement policy. 22 It is the submission of TSSE that there is already
sufficient protection within the existing regulatory framework to ensure that
sanctioning is proportionate and targets those who deserve the attention of the
enforcement authorities.
Trading Standards Institute (TSI)
1.749 Most TSSs already follow this procedure in some way. Once they have identified
infringements, they seek, where appropriate, to warn the offenders by way of
advice notices and leaflets detailing how to comply and what future steps Trading
Standards may take to ensure compliance. Assuming this is the case, then the
above is unlikely to be a problem. There could, however, be exceptions for
fastmoving LA-hopping crimes such as bogus doorstep callers who are always
trying to keep ahead of the law. In this case, delaying justice could lead to an
increase in the number of victims (who tend to be elderly and vulnerable). As long
as provisions are made for cases of this nature, TSI would consider proceeding
with the above Proposal.
City of London Law Society
1.750 We think it is important that process fairness applies both to a civil penalty regime
and criminal offences. If it is possible to avoid overlap between matters covered
by civil penalties and matters covered by criminal offences this should help.
However, where the same actions could give rise to both civil penalties and
criminal prosecution, we are concerned about the interplay of the two and the
effect on rules of evidence and the presumption of innocence if there is a
requirement that non criminal regulatory steps must be taken before a criminal
prosecution. We agree that regulators should have duties to warn potential
offenders that they may be subject to prosecution, where that is the case. We
also think that where a matter is more appropriately dealt with by way of a civil
procedure, the courts should have power to stay proceedings – subject to what
we say above about evidence and the presumption of innocence.
21 L.B. Wandsworth v Rashid [2009] EWHC 1844 (Admin) .
22 R v Adaway [2004] EWCA Crim 2831 .
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