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Take Notice of Bribery Laws

24/11/2011

DOES your firm’s hospitality or Christmas gift arrangements pass tough new corruption and bribery laws? The Bolton News

How about your overseas deals, foreign contractors and partners?

At home and abroad, firms need to check they are doing all they can to prevent corruption because “failure to prevent bribery” by a commercial organisation is an offence under new legislation.

A Bolton law firm has already seen a rise in inquiries about the new Bribery Act.

Jonathan Shorrock, corporate and commercial partner at KBL Solicitors in Mawdsley Street, Bolton, says firms are gradually realising they must act.

He said: “I am already advising several Bolton clients who operate significantly overseas or in the public sector — giving them details and guidance on how to evaluate their risks.”

Mr Shorrock said requests for advice have picked up in recent months He added: “When the act was first published in 2010 there was a lot of publicity in the legal and financial press and every consultancy was running seminars on it.

“Firms are not aware of the risks. They need to think about this.

“Implementation of the act was deferred initially to allow time for the Ministry of Justice to publish guidance on the adequacy of procedures an organisation should put in place to show they are taking steps to prevent corruption — but now it’s law, people realise they need to do something.”

Mr Shorrock said the key points are to be aware of legislation, assess the risks faced by your business, and take realistic steps, starting with best practice.

Regarding hospitality and facilitation payments, he added: “A thank you lunch for a job well done or a bottle of whisky at Christmas won’t raise anybody’s blood pressure.

However, everything has a context.

“For example, the Chelsea football tycoon Roman Abramovich probably regularly flies people in helicopters. That’s the world he lives in.

“However if ‘Mr X’ of Bolton landed his firstever contract against the odds by behaving in such a way then the context would be very different.”

KBL is concentrating on individual clients as each firm’s circumstances vary