Bribery Act Guidance - Is your organisation ready?

The Bribery Act guidance focuses on six principles and encourages a risk-based, proportionate and common sense approach to all policies and procedures. The act itself is just 17 pages in length, and only contains four substantive offences, but it is the scope of one offence in particular that will have to be addressed within your organisation.

Section 7 (failure of commercial organisations to prevent bribery), has been criticised for being too widely drawn, introducing some novel concepts and handing a lot of discretion to the Serious Fraud Office. Although it states that ‘the objective of the act is not to bring the full force of the criminal law to bear upon well-run organisations’, there is a serious risk of being caught out.

Penalties for falling foul of the Act for individuals can be as severe as 7 – 10 years imprisonment. Businesses who fail to take all reasonable steps to prevent bribery from taking place face unlimited fines. In sever cases, Judges have stated that they intend to fix fines at a level specifically designed to dive companies out of business.

Justice secretary Kenneth Clarke has tried to reassure companies that the act would be enforced with common sense, but it is clear that this pragmatic approach will only be applicable to those organisations that have taken the act seriously and have reviewed and amended their contracts and policies accordingly.

McKinnells are here to provide guidance on the bribery act and are available to offer tangible assistance on the act’s thorniest issues, such as:

· The UK’s jurisdiction over non-UK companies
· The extent of third-party liability
· The boundary between corporate hospitality and a prosecutable bribe.

Remember, your only defence is to take all reasonable steps to prevent corruption. We offer a comprehensive and diligent assessment of the risks faced by your business and work with you to put in place policies, procedures and training to protect it.