Part 3: Sale and delivery of knives Section 37: Defence to sale of bladed articles to persons under 18: Northern Ireland
Article 54 of the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 provides that it is an offence to sell or hire specific articles with a blade or point to persons under the age of 18 years. Paragraph (4) of that Article provides a defence for a person charged with this offence, to prove that they took all reasonable precautions and exercised due diligence to avoid the commission of the offence.
	Section 37 amends Article 54 to place certain limitations on the defence where the sale or hiring is carried out remotely and inserts a new Article 54A which sets out those limitations. A remote sale is any sale where the seller or person acting on the seller’s behalf was not in the presence of the buyer at the point of sale. This includes, for example, when the sale was made online, by mail order or over the telephone, and applies to both individuals and companies.
	In order to be able to rely on this defence, the accused must meet all of the conditions set out below.
Condition A – at the time the offence is alleged to have been committed, the seller operated a system for checking that those who bought articles under Article 54 were not under the age of 18 and the system was likely to prevent persons under the age of 18 from buying such articles by that method
Condition B – when the package containing the article was dispatched, the seller had clearly marked it to indicate that it contained an article with a blade or with a sharp point and that, when finally delivered, it should only be delivered into the hands of a person aged 18 or over;
Condition C – the seller took all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to ensure that, when finally delivered, the package would be delivered into the hands of a person aged 18 or over;
Condition D – the seller did not deliver the package, or arrange for its delivery, to a locker.
	Paragraph (8) of new Article 54A defines the term "final delivery" and paragraph (9) defines the term "locker".
	This section forms part of the law of Northern Ireland.