The court considered the relationship between the appeals procedure provided for by the regulations and the ‘reasonable excuse for non-compliance’ provisions in s.58(1)(4) of the statute.
Held: Skinner J said: ‘I prefer to look at the scheme laid down in this Act and its associated Regulations. A comprehensive right of appeal is given by s.58(3) which was not available under the Noise Abatement Act, 1960. Regulation 4(2) . . permits an appeal on the ground that the notice is not justified by the terms of the statute. In my judgment an excuse cannot be ‘reasonable’ under s.58(3) if it involves matters which could have been raised on appeal under s.58(3) unless such matters arose after the appeal was heard, or if there was no appeal after the time for appealing had expired.’
Lord Justice Ackner said: ‘. . can the defendant urge as a reasonable excuse for failing to comply with the notice, that the same was invalid for one or more of the reasons provided by the regulations as permissible grounds of appeal? . . The answer to my mind is clearly in the negative. Not only is the right of appeal given by the statute but very detailed provisions have been made by the Regulations for the prosecution of such appeals. S.58(4) was not designed to give the recipient of the notice a choice of forum in which to mount his attack on the notice. It was designed to provide a defence to a criminal charge where he had some reasonable excuse, such as special difficulty in compliance with the notice. It does not provide an opportunity, when prosecuted, to challenge the correctness and justificiation of the notice where the defendant has not availed himself of this statutory opportunity to do so by way of appeal.’
Judges:
Justice Skinner and Lord Justice Ackner
Citations:
[1981] 1 WLR 898
Statutes:
Control of Pollution Act 1974 58
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – AMEC Building Limited and Squibb and Davies Limited v London Borough of Camden Admn 19-Jul-1996
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Environment
Updated: 09 May 2022; Ref: scu.227907