Commentary on Sections Part 1: The Commission for Equality and Human Rights Section 15: Codes of practice: supplemental
52.Subsection (1) of this section makes provision for the codes of practice issued under section 14 to be revised. Subsection (3) provides for any code to be revoked by an order made by the Secretary of State at the request of the CEHR. An order to revoke a code will be subject to the negative resolution Parliamentary procedure.
53.Subsection (4) describes the legal effect of a code of practice. It provides that a failure to comply with a provision of a code of practice does not itself give rise to criminal or civil proceedings, but a code of practice is admissible in such proceedings and must be taken into account by a court or tribunal if the court or tribunal considers the code to be relevant.
54.Subsection (5) disapplies the requirement in subsection (4)(b) for a court or tribunal to take account of a code of practice issued under section 14(4).  However, the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006 provides for the Scottish courts and tribunals to take account of such codes.
55.Subsection (6) provides for an order-making power to allow the Secretary of State to vary the range of matters that codes of practice may address.  In accordance with section 39(4), any such order will be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.