Import, Export and Customs Powers (Defence) Act 1939

The Import, Export and Customs Powers (Defence) Act 1939 created broad order-making powers over imports, exports, coastwise carriage and ships' stores at the opening of the Second World War. It enabled domestic licensing and customs enforcement alongside Britain's blockade and trading-with-the-enemy system.

Wartime function

Orders under the Act could prohibit or regulate goods and attach customs machinery to the controls. Export licensing supported denial of supplies to Germany and management of neutral trade, working with the British Ministry of Economic Warfare campaign against Germany (1939-1945), contraband control and navicerts. The Act itself supplied authority. Ministers, licensing bodies, Customs and naval forces performed different operational roles under separate instruments.

Later legal status

The Act is neither wholly repealed nor the current foundation for all British export controls. Section 15 of the Export Control Act (UK, 2002) repealed the 1939 export-control and related provisions when the successor regime commenced on 1 May 2004. Later export-control orders provide the current framework. Surviving parts of the 1939 Act remain relevant principally to import control.

Any current statement therefore requires a provision-level check against the revised text. The statute's long life does not establish that one unchanged emergency power governed British exports for six decades. Historical employment also requires the relevant wartime order or licence rather than inference from the enabling Act alone.

The transition matters for legal attribution. A restriction made under the 1939 Act retains its own historical basis, while a modern control may rest on the 2002 Act and the Export Control Order 2008. The responsible minister, licensing authority and customs enforcement body must be dated to the period discussed.

See also

Export-control licensing regime · Export licensing of strategic materials · Re-export and transshipment controls · Contraband control

Sources

• United Kingdom, Import, Export and Customs Powers (Defence) Act 1939, current revised and original texts.
• United Kingdom, Export Control Act 2002, current revised text.
• United Kingdom, Export Control Act 2002, section 15, repeal and revocation provision.
• United Kingdom, Export Control Act 2002 (Commencement) Order 2003, commencement on 1 May 2004.
• United Kingdom, Export of Goods, Transfer of Technology and Provision of Technical Assistance (Control) Order 2003, initial successor instrument.
• United Kingdom, Export Control Order 2008, current revised successor framework.