{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/draft-armed-forces-court-martial-rules-2009/article-3",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/draft-armed-forces-court-martial-rules-2009/article-3.json",
  "legislation": "ukdsi/2009/9780111479216",
  "legislation_title": "The Armed Forces (Court Martial) Rules 2009",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/draft-armed-forces-court-martial-rules-2009",
  "path": "article/3",
  "kind": "article",
  "number": "3",
  "heading": "Interpretation: general",
  "text": "(1) Any reference in these Rules to a numbered section is to that section of the 2006 Act unless otherwise stated.\n(2) In these Rules—\n“the 2006 Act” means the Armed Forces Act 2006;\n“the 1967 Act” means the Criminal Justice Act 1967;\n“the 1968 Act” means the Court Martial Appeals Act 1968;\n“the 1999 Act” means the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999;\n“the 2003 Act” means the Criminal Justice Act 2003;\n“the CPIA Order” means the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996 (Application to the Armed Forces) Order 2009;\n“advance information” has the meaning given by rule 43(2);\n“allocated for Court Martial trial” means regarded for the purposes of Part 5 of the 2006 Act as allocated for Court Martial trial;\n“the Appeal Court” means the Court Martial Appeal Court;\n“bad character” has the meaning given by section 98 of the 2003 Act;\n“civilian police force” means a UK police force or a British overseas territory police force;\n“the court” means the Court Martial;\n“DX” means document exchange;\n“detention and training order” means an order under section 211;\n“the judge advocate”, in relation to any proceedings, means the judge advocate specified for the proceedings under section 155(5);\n“the lay members” has the same meaning as in section 155;\n“legal representative” means a person appointed under rule 39;\n“live link”, except in Part 15, has the meaning given by rule 18(3)(a);\n“the minimum number” means—\n(a) in the case of proceedings to which rule 29 applies, five;\n(b) in the case of any other proceedings, three;\n“the original sentence”, in relation to activation proceedings, has the same meaning as in Part 17;\n“pre-sentence report” has the meaning given by section 257;\n“the president of the board” means the lay member (if any) who by virtue of rule 34 is the president of the board;\n“proceedings with lay members” means any proceedings other than those listed in rule 27;\n“qualified to be the president of the board” has the meaning given by rule 34(3);\n“suspended sentence order” means an order under section 189(1) of the 2003 Act (suspended sentence of imprisonment) made by a relevant service court, as defined by section 196(2) of the 2006 Act;\n“unit” means—\n(a) a naval ship or establishment;\n(b) any body of members of Her Majesty’s forces formed under the command of a person appointed to be the commanding officer of the body; or\n(c) an air force station.\n(3) Any reference in these Rules to Schedule 8 to the 2003 Act is to that Schedule as modified by Schedule 5 to the 2006 Act.",
  "extent": null,
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [
    {
      "type": "footnote",
      "label": "f1",
      "text": "1967 c. 80."
    },
    {
      "type": "footnote",
      "label": "f2",
      "text": "1999 c. 23."
    },
    {
      "type": "footnote",
      "label": "f3",
      "text": "S.I. 2009/988."
    }
  ],
  "outstanding_effects": [],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2009/9780111479216/article/3",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-10-30T14:57:31.031139+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}