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Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill

This debate also took place in Committee, but it is worth placing it on the record that, by definition, the offence of corporate manslaughter amounts to the causing of a person’s death where there is a ““gross breach”” of"““a relevant duty of care””." We are not talking about a trivial matter of negligence. As the hon. Gentleman knows better than I do, a gross breach is a strong test before the courts. It would be necessary to prove both the corporate manslaughter and the corporate nature of that manslaughter before any individual would be caught within the realms of new clause 1 or, as I will explain later, new clause 6. We might disagree about whether people should be imprisoned, but the powers will never be used for a trivial matter and the court will have to apply a strong test.