The Industrial Pollution Control (Northern Ireland) Order 1997

Public registers of information

20.—(1) It shall be the duty of each enforcing authority, as respects prescribed processes for which it is the enforcing authority, to maintain, in accordance with regulations made by the Department, a register containing prescribed particulars of or relating to—

(a) applications for authorisations made to that authority;

(b) the authorisations which have been granted by that authority or in respect of which the authority has functions under this Order;

(c) variation notices, enforcement notices and prohibition notices issued by that authority;

(d) revocations of authorisations effected by that authority;

(e) appeals under Article 15;

(f) convictions for such offences under Article 23(1) as may be prescribed;

(g) information obtained or furnished in pursuance of the conditions of authorisations or under any provision of this Order;

(h) directions given to the authority under any provision of this Order by the Department; and

(i) such other matters relating to the carrying on of prescribed processes or any pollution of the environment caused thereby as may be prescribed;

but that duty is subject to Articles 21 and 22.

(2) The register maintained by a district council shall also contain prescribed particulars of such information contained in any register maintained by the chief inspector as relates to the carrying on in the district of the district council of prescribed processes in relation to which the chief inspector has functions under this Order; and the chief inspector shall furnish each district council with the particulars which are necessary to enable it to discharge its duty under this paragraph.

(3) Where information of any description is excluded from any register by virtue of Article 22, a statement shall be entered in the register indicating the existence of information of that description.

(4) The Department may give to enforcing authorities directions requiring the removal from any register of theirs of any specified information not prescribed for inclusion under paragraph (1) or (2) or which, by virtue of Article 22, ought to have been excluded from the register.

(5) The Secretary of State may give to enforcing authorities directions requiring the removal from any register of theirs of any specified information which by virtue of Article 21 ought to have been excluded from the register.

(6) It shall be the duty of each enforcing authority—

(a) to secure that the registers maintained by them under this Article are available, at all reasonable times, for inspection by the public free of charge; and

(b) to afford to members of the public facilities for obtaining copies of entries, on payment of reasonable charges;

and, for the purposes of this paragraph, places may be prescribed at which any such registers or facilities as are mentioned in sub-paragraph (a) or (b) are to be available or afforded to the public in pursuance of the sub-paragraph in question.

(7) Registers under this Article may be kept in any form.

(8) In this Article “prescribed” means prescribed in regulations under this Article.