Director of Public Prosecutions v Camp

For the purposes of Road Traffic Act 1988, section 7(6), whether a person has a reasonable excuse for failing to provide a specimen is a question of fact assessed objectively in the circumstances. Physical or mental incapacity may be relevant, but it does not automatically make the excuse reasonable. Self-induced intoxication may explain an inability to provide a breath specimen, yet it will not necessarily amount to a reasonable excuse. The concepts of medical reasons under section 7(3)(a) and reasonable excuse under section 7(6) are distinct. The power to require blood or urine does not create a duty to use that alternative procedure before prosecuting for failure to provide a breath specimen.

The Director of Public Prosecutions appealed by way of case stated from the respondent’s acquittal by District Judge Veits at Lincoln Magistrates’ Court. The respondent had been required to provide evidential breath specimens after being stopped while heavily intoxicated. The district judge found that he was physically unable to provide a specimen because he was too drunk and treated that incapacity as a reasonable excuse under section 7(6) of the Road Traffic Act 1988.

The appeal concerned whether self-induced intoxication could constitute a reasonable excuse in those circumstances and whether the police were required to abandon the breath procedure and require blood or urine instead.

1. Appeal allowed. The acquittal was quashed and the case was remitted to the magistrates’ court with a direction to convict.
2. Under section 7(6) of the Road Traffic Act 1988, reasonable excuse is always a question of fact for the court on the evidence. The provision does not exclude an excuse based on physical or mental incapacity, including incapacity associated with intoxication. However, a true explanation for failure is not necessarily a reasonable excuse.
3. The court must distinguish the statutory concept of medical reasons in section 7(3)(a) from reasonable excuse in section 7(6). A constable’s decision whether there are medical reasons for requiring blood or urine is different from the court’s objective assessment of whether the defendant’s reason for failing to provide breath was reasonable.
4. Self-induced intoxication may constitute a medical reason for the purposes of section 7(3), as recognised in Young v DPP, but that does not establish a reasonable excuse under section 7(6). The availability of an alternative blood or urine procedure does not itself make failure to provide breath reasonable.
5. On the evidence, the district judge had erred by treating physical inability caused by intoxication as necessarily reasonable. The respondent understood what was required of him, and the evidence that he was too drunk to provide the specimen did not preclude a finding that he had no reasonable excuse. It generally supported that conclusion.
6. The provisions concerning the alternative specimen procedure are permissive, not mandatory. Section 7(6) creates a free-standing offence. The officers were entitled to abandon the breath procedure and were under no duty to require blood or urine before charging the respondent.

• High Court (Administrative Court): Allowed the DPP’s appeal from the acquittal by District Judge Veits at Lincoln Magistrates’ Court. The acquittal was quashed and the case was remitted with a direction to convict.