According to the statutory instrument published on legislation.gov.uk, the Crime and Policing Act 2026 (Commencement No. 3 and Saving Provisions) Regulations 2026 were made on 2 September 2026 in the name of the Secretary of State and signed by Sarah Jones, Minister of State at the Home Office. This is the third set of commencement regulations under the 2026 Act and it does not bring the whole Act into force at once. Instead, it fixes four implementation dates across September and October, with different legal effects attaching to each group of provisions. That phased approach matters for police forces, courts, local authorities, housing providers and extradition practitioners. A provision contained in the 2026 Act is not generally operational until it has been commenced, and these Regulations show that the Government is sequencing implementation by subject area rather than by Part number alone.
From 21 September 2026, the Regulations commence a cluster of provisions concerned with court procedure and police list arrangements. The legislation.gov.uk text brings into force section 50 only so far as needed to give meaning to 'defendant' for CCE prevention orders, alongside section 58(6) on appeal rules, section 61(2) and (4) on rules of court for special measures for witnesses, section 62(1), and part of section 63 so far as it connects to the commenced sentencing provision in Schedule 6. The same commencement date also activates sections 205 to 213 on barred and advisory lists, together with Schedule 25 for special police forces, except where parts are already in force. In practical terms, this first tranche is mainly about legal machinery. It enables rule-making, interpretation and list-related arrangements before wider operational use.
From 29 September 2026, the Regulations bring into force sections 113 to 115 on other sexual offences, section 204 on appeals to police appeals tribunals to the extent not already commenced, and section 246 on extradition where a person has already been convicted. This is a more substantive commencement date than the 21 September tranche, because it reaches beyond court rules and into criminal liability, police discipline and cross-border procedure. For practitioners, the key point is that these measures start on the date stated in the instrument, not on Royal Assent and not when the wider Act was passed. Prosecutors, defence representatives and police professional standards teams will therefore need to align case handling with the exact commencement date attached to each section.
Regulation 6 then preserves the pre-existing law for some extradition cases. The amendments made by section 246(2) to section 20 of the Extradition Act 2003, covering category 1 territories, do not apply where the extradition hearing follows an arrest under section 3 or 5 of the 2003 Act and that arrest took place before 29 September 2026. The same approach applies to the amendments made by section 246(3) to section 85 for category 2 territories where the arrest took place before that date under section 71, 73 or 74A. This saving provision is important because it avoids a mid-case change in the applicable rules. Hearings linked to arrests made before 29 September 2026 continue under the earlier statutory position, which gives courts and parties a clear temporal dividing line and reduces the risk of argument over retrospectivity.
From 26 October 2026, the Regulations commence a substantial package on anti-social behaviour. The provisions started on that date are section 1 on respect orders, section 2 on youth injunctions and housing injunctions, section 3(1) to (4) on the maximum period for certain directions, notices and orders, section 4 on fixed penalty notices, section 5 on closure of premises by a registered social housing provider, and section 6 on reviews of responses to complaints about anti-social behaviour. Schedules 1 to 3 are also brought into force for the connected consequential and supplementary changes. For councils, police forces and registered providers of social housing, this is the date with the clearest frontline effect. The package creates a revised enforcement and complaints framework, and organisations dealing with neighbourhood disorder will need policies, forms, delegated powers and staff guidance in place before the October start date.
The final tranche in these Regulations takes effect on 29 October 2026. It commences sections 151 to 153 on SIM farms, sections 154 to 156 on offences of possession and supply of a specified article and related supplementary provision, sections 197 and 198 on the police accelerated investigation procedure for criminal conduct and the conditions for notifying the Director of Public Prosecutions of an investigation report, and Schedule 16 on powers of entry linked to possession or supply offences. That grouping brings together communications-enabled offending and police misconduct process. The immediate operational effect is likely to fall on investigators, digital crime teams and those responsible for misconduct case management, because the new offences and related powers require clear handling rules from the first day they apply.
The explanatory note states that no separate impact assessment has been produced for this statutory instrument because impact assessments were prepared for the Crime and Policing Act 2026 itself. The Home Office says copies can be obtained from 2 Marsham Street or through the Government publication page for the Crime and Policing Bill 2025 impact assessments. That places this instrument firmly in the implementation phase rather than the policy development phase. Taken as a whole, this statutory instrument is less about announcing fresh policy than about fixing the legal start dates for measures already enacted by Parliament. Its practical value lies in certainty. Anyone working across policing, criminal procedure, extradition or anti-social behaviour now has a date-specific commencement map: 21 September 2026 for procedural and list provisions, 29 September 2026 for sexual offences, police appeals and extradition changes, 26 October 2026 for anti-social behaviour measures, and 29 October 2026 for SIM farm, specified article and police investigation provisions.