National Coal Board v Gamble

Facts

A lorry belonging to a haulage contractor was loaded with coal at a colliery of the National Coal Board and weighed on the weighbridge there, which showed that it was heavily over the permitted weight for use on the road. Employees of the Board knew this. The driver took the weighbridge ticket and said that he would take the risk, and the lorry was allowed to leave the colliery and was driven on the road.

History

The justices convicted the Board of aiding and abetting the offence of using the vehicle with an excess load. The Board appealed by case stated to the Divisional Court.

Issue

Whether a person who sells and delivers goods, knowing that the buyer will use them in committing an offence, aids and abets that offence; and whether the absence of any interest in the offence, or of a wish that it be committed, is a defence.

Held

Appeal dismissed. The Board had, with knowledge of the facts, assisted the commission of the offence by allowing the overloaded lorry to leave, and was an aider and abettor.

Ratio

• A person who does an act that assists a principal to commit an offence, knowing of the facts that make the conduct of the principal an offence, aids and abets it; intention in this context means intending to do the act of assistance, and neither a desire for the offence nor an improper motive is required, so indifference to the outcome is no defence.

The judgments

Key reasoning

• The Board knew the weight of the load and that the lorry would be driven on the public road, so it knew the facts that made the use of the vehicle by the driver an offence.
• Letting the lorry go was a positive act of assistance, and the Board could have prevented the offence simply by refusing to release it.
• The sale and delivery of goods does not become innocent because the seller is motivated by commercial interest and not by a wish to see the offence committed; the question is the intention to do the act of assistance with the knowledge, not the purpose behind it.
• The argument that property passed on loading, so the Board had nothing further to do, failed because the Board retained the physical ability to hold the lorry back.

Where it fits in the module

Topic 6 on complicity is built around the conduct and mental elements of secondary liability and the question whether accessories must share the purpose of the principal. The case establishes that assistance with knowledge suffices, which has to be read with later authority on the fault required, including R v Jogee [2016] UKSC 8, where the Supreme Court restated the mental element for accessories as intention to assist or encourage with knowledge of the essential matters. It is also a standard case on the role of motive in the criminal law.

Criticisms

• Equating intention with knowledge of the facts and a deliberate act of assistance stretches the idea of intention, since the Board did not aim at the offence and was indifferent to it.
• The reasoning risks making ordinary suppliers liable for any offence committed by customers who they know will misuse the goods, without a principled limit based on the closeness of the contribution.
• The distinction between motive and intention is hard to maintain in practice, and the case does not say when commercial indifference becomes the fault required for accessory liability.