Blunkett to publish draft Bill on corporate killing
Special report: Sceptical response to long awaited announcement
Government plans to fulfil a six-year-old pledge by publishing a draft Bill on corporate killing, were met with some scepticism this week.
On Tuesday, Home Secretary David Blunkett announced that a timetable for laws on corporate manslaughter would finally be published this autumn. The move was no great surprise following reports in the Guardian on Monday (19 May), which claimed that Government intentions on corporate killing would be made clear this week.
Reacting to the Guardian's reports at the opening of the RoSPA Congress in Birmingham on Monday morning, Nick Brown, the minister responsible for health and safety at work, said: "It is for the Home Secretary to make his announcement and I wouldn't wish to steal his thunder. But I'd expect a decision soon, maybe as early as tomorrow."
Sure enough, on Tuesday Mr Blunkett confirmed a draft Bill was to be published. In a statement released at Westminster, he said: "There is great public concern at the criminal law's lack of success in convicting companies of manslaughter where a death has occurred due to gross negligence by the organisation as a whole. The law needs to be clear and effective in order to secure public confidence and must bite properly on large corporations whose failure to set or maintain standards causes a death."
In effect the new offence will make it easier to prosecute companies responsible for the deaths of members of the public or its employees. At present it is difficult under existing criminal law to prosecute an organisation for manslaughter because the current legal test requires there to be "gross negligence" on the part of a "controlling mind". A new corporate killing law would allow an organisation to be prosecuted for causing death as a result of serious management failure on the part of the organisation.
Controversially, Mr Blunkett said that the criminal liability of company directors would not be targeted by the legislation. In its original consultation document the Government appeared to favour the prosecution of directors shown to have contributed to an offence. Such plans have clearly been dropped following mounting pressure from business groups.
Director's responsibility
Labour backbencher Andrew Dismore had tabled an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill for debate on Tuesday designed to bring forward an offence of corporate killing. Mr Blunkett's announcement means that the Government has rejected the option of amending current legislation in favour of a new draft Bill.
Mr Dismore said he was now confident that the Government was taking major steps forward, but that it must go further and make individual company directors personally liable.
He said: "Unless individual directors are under personal obligations, they will never take safety as seriously as they do the need to make profits. You need to look at the company as a whole and if the company as a whole has failed, woefully failed, to look after people's safety - whether it be an employee or a member of the public - then that company should be in the dock and the senior directors of the company should be there with it."
Thompsons Solicitors, the UK's largest trade union and personal injury law firm, said it believed the proposals would let company directors off the hook by not making them individually criminally liable for management failings which lead to deaths.
Mick Antoniw, a partner in the firm, said: "It seems the Government thinks financial wrongdoing is more serious than killing people. The Enterprise Act 2002 has a strong deterrent effect that includes custodial sentences. If prison is seen as an acceptable deterrent under this Act, why not for breaches of health and safety?"
A long time coming
Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Simon Hughes said: "It took seventy five MPs signing an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill to shame the Government into honouring its 1997 manifesto pledge. But better six years late than not at all.
"As the law currently stands, the risks taken by grossly negligent companies are absolutely minimal. It is surely the Government's duty to send a strong message to companies which endanger lives, that such behaviour will lead to very substantial fines and loss of reputation.''
But Safe Trains Action Group chairman Maureen Kavanagh, who lost her son Peter in the 1997 Southall rail crash, said: "We are disappointed that a new law is not being brought in straightaway. The Government seems to have a hidden agenda.
"There are good companies who are doing all the right things to look after their staff. But there are also bad employees and people who are grossly negligent. We're just worried that this announcement today is just another ploy by the Government and that this whole process will be stretched out."
Mrs Kavanagh added: "Labour promised a change of the law back in 1997. It's unacceptable that they have still not done anything."
Fair treatment or cynical spin?
Michael Roberts, director of business environment at the Confederation of British Industry, said: "This announcement steers clear of some of the pitfalls that had most worried business. It is absolutely right that negligent firms should be prosecuted for gross misconduct leading to death. But responsible firms with good health and safety practices must be treated fairly.
"We are particularly pleased that the Government has avoided the temptation to target individual directors. Good health and safety practice comes from a shared responsibility across the workforce, not from trying to blame an individual unfairly. The CBI will study the new proposals carefully and looks forward to making a constructive contribution."
However, a spokesman for the Transport and General Workers Union said: "The Home Office is guilty of cynical spin to buy off a backbench revolt on corporate killing. Newspaper leaks of early action to honour Labour's manifesto pledge have proved groundless.
"There will be no Bill for six months and no new law for two years. In the meantime, 500 workers could die. The time has come for a tough new law, holding company directors who preside over unsafe practices personally liable for death or injury. The first employer who goes to jail will transform safety standards overnight. Downing Street must not give in to pressure from the CBI."
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