A byelaw is a law which only affects the area of a Council.  They are issued (made) by that Council only when it has been granted the power to do so by an Act of Parliament.  The purpose of byelaws is to prevent or reduce some nuisance or harm to people who live, visit or work in that area.  Basically – they act like other laws, but deal with local problems rather than national problems.  They must not be inconsistent with national laws, however, nor can they be “manifestly unreasonable”.  They can be enforced by the Council or by police in some circumstances.

Today, new byelaws are approved by national government departments.  Some departments provide standard byelaws which Councils can choose to adopt.  For example, the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) provide model byelaws about coastal problems.  Byelaws which do not broadly follow model examples from government departments are very rare today.

Havant Borough Council took responsibility for the duties of urban and rural councils operating in the same area during the changes to Local Government structure in 1972.  Some of the byelaws listed below refer to those earlier authorities.  However, they remain valid until either superseded by national law, or withdrawn by Havant Borough Council even if they are of little relevance any more.  The Council has not prosecuted for improper use of Gramophones for some time, for example!

You may also note that several of the older byelaws for our area refer to pre-decimal sums of money.  These sums were raised by the Criminal Law Act 1977 and other legislation so that now they fit into what is called the “standard scale” for fines.  This makes the maximum fine for breaking most byelaws £500 rather than one shilling.

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