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Section 14: Meaning of "special procedure material".

Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 · 1984 c. 60View on legislation.gov.uk

Part II: Powers of Entry, Search and Seizure

In this Act "special procedure material" means—

material to which subsection (2) below applies; and
journalistic material, other than excluded material.

Subject to the following provisions of this section, this subsection applies to material, other than items subject to legal privilege and excluded material, in the possession of a person who—

acquired or created it in the course of any trade, business, profession or other occupation or for the purpose of any paid or unpaid office; and
holds it subject—
to an express or implied undertaking to hold it in confidence; or
to a restriction or obligation such as is mentioned in section 11(2)(b) above.

Where material is acquired—

by an employee from his employer and in the course of his employment; or
by a company from an associated company,

it is only special procedure material if it was special procedure material immediately before the acquisition.

Where material is created by an employee in the course of his employment, it is only special procedure material if it would have been special procedure material had his employer created it.

Where material is created by a company on behalf of an associated company, it is only special procedure material if it would have been special procedure material had the associated company created it.

A company is to be treated as another's associated company for the purposes of this section if it would be so treated under section 449 of the Corporation Tax Act 2010.

About this text

This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.