The Channel Tunnel (Miscellaneous Provisions) Order 1994

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Order)

This Order gives qualified effect in United Kingdom law, from the date of entry into force of the Agreement, to material provisions (the “tripartite articles” set out in Schedule 2) of the Agreement on rail traffic between Belgium and the United Kingdom mentioned in article 1(1), and its attached Protocol.

The Order also makes a number of amendments to the Channel Tunnel (International Arrangements) Order 1993 and other instruments. Some of these are directly related to the tripartite articles, and have effect only from the date of entry into force of the Agreement (see article 1(1)). To cater for the possibility that the start of Channel Tunnel rail traffic, between the United Kingdom and France or Belgium or both, might be earlier than that date, the amendments mentioned in article 1(3) (which are not exclusively related to the Agreement) are by virtue of article 1(2) given effect from 1st July 1994.

The tripartite articles are by article 3(1) given the force of law within, and for the purposes specified in article 2(2) outside, the control zones accorded to Belgium (“the Belgian control zone”) and to France by the tripartite articles; article 3(2) affirms that Belgian, and French, officers may to the extent specified in the tripartite articles go about their business (essentially, the operation of their national frontier controls as defined in the tripartite articles) in the United Kingdom, and article 3(3) ensures that Belgian officers can be provided with the required facilities. Article 4(1), by extending relevant enactments to the control zones accorded to the United Kingdom in Belgium and France (the “United Kingdom control zones”), performs the corresponding operation for British officers working there. Article 4(2) and (3) alters the application of the Data Protection Act 1984 so that related computer operations carried out by British officers in the United Kingdom control zone in Belgium are, but Belgian computer operations in the Belgian control zone are not, subject to that Act.

Article 5(1) to (3) extends English criminal jurisdiction to conduct in a United Kingdom control zone which, if taking place in England, would constitute an offence under a frontier control enactment as defined in Schedule 1. Article 5(4) creates a presumption as to jurisdiction where it is uncertain in which of the three States an offence not of that kind was committed.

Article 6 gives effect to Schedule 3; article 7 modifies the enactments specified in their application to Belgium and France and in their application to the United Kingdom for the article 2(2) purposes; and article 8 gives effect to Schedule 4.

The definitions in Schedule 1 are of expressions of which some occur both in the body of the Order and in enactments as modified by the Order, some only in the latter (see article2(1)).

The tripartite articles referred to above are set out in Schedule 2.

Part I of Schedule 3 to the Channel Tunnel (International Arrangements) Order 1993 (“the 1993 Order”) contains provision as to the powers of police and other officers, including the extension of powers of arrest and detention, and provision for co-operation with French authorities in criminal justice matters. Schedule 3 to this Order incorporates that Part with specified variations adapting it to the tripartite articles.

Schedule 4 contains amendments to a number of instruments, including the 1993 Order. The amendments in paragraphs 1 to 5, 7 and 8(a), and those made by paragraph 11 to paragraphs 1(11)(d) and 3(b) of Schedule 4 to the 1993 Order, and those in paragraph 13, are directly related to new provision made by this Order in connection with rail traffic between the United Kingdom and Belgium. The amendments in paragraphs 6 and 8(b) combine corrections with new provision; those in paragraphs 9 and 10 remedy deficiencies in the 1993 Order; the remaining amendments in paragraph 11 and those in paragraph 12(1) to (3) provide for the designation of international stations at which static immigration and other controls may be exercised; and those in paragraph 12(4) are corrections.