The council laid complaints against the defenedant that it had not properly re-instated road surfaces after completing works. It now appealed, by way of case stated, against the court’s acceptance of the defendant’s argument that the large number of individual complaints would lead to a risk of a substantially greater punishment than parliament had intended, and that this amounted to an abuse of process.
Held: The appeal failed. The judge had been correct to say that it was wrong to complain of each separate error. It was not open to the council to lay multiple informations under the subsection in relation to a single date (though the defendant has accepted that it was open to the council to lay separate informations in relation to different dates). The laying of multiple informations in respect of a single offence was an abuse of process.
Judges:
Richards LJ, Openshaw J
Citations:
[2007] EWHC 2535 (Admin), [2008] 1 All ER 1137, [2008] 1 WLR 2562
Links:
Statutes:
New Roads and Street Works Act 1991
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Director of Public Prosecutions v Humphrys HL 1977
Humphrys was charged with driving while disqualified. The issue was the correctness of the identification by a police constable. In evidence, Humphrys denied that he was the driver, or indeed that he had driven any car during the year in question. . .
Cited – British Telecommunications Plc v Nottinghamshire County Council Admn 21-Oct-1998
The court considered an appeal by case stated against a conviction on 2 informations under sections 71(1) and (5). One alleged a failure to comply with the prescribed requirements as to the specification of materials to be used in reinstating the . .
Cited – Thames Water Utilities Ltd v London Borough of Bromley Admn 4-Mar-2000
The court considered an appeal by case stated against a conviction on 16 separate informations alleging offences of failing to complete permanent reinstatement as required by section 70(4). . .
Cited – Regina v Manchester Coroner, ex parte Tal 1985
The court asked whether the Divisional Court was bound by previous decisions of that court, and answered: ‘we find it difficult to imagine that a single judge exercising this (supervisory) jurisdiction (of the High Court) would ever depart from a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Utilities, Criminal Practice
Updated: 05 December 2022; Ref: scu.260206