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Queen’s Speech

My Lords, I wish to speak briefly on the Bribery Bill. I support it strongly in principle but it raises several problems and it is important that it is properly scrutinised by Parliament. I was a member, along with the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, of the Joint Committee that carried out pre-legislative scrutiny between May and July. I congratulate the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, on his excellent chairmanship, which managed to get us through. However, as the Government admit, it was a very rushed timetable and the fact that by tradition such Joint Committees produce so-called "unanimous" reports should not cause us to think that there are not serious issues still to be debated. It may be said that the draft Bill in different forms has twice been considered by the Law Commission, which has done valuable work, but it is Parliament that is responsible for getting legislation right and which collectively has far more legislative understanding than any external body. One of the things that has been lacking over recent years has been any Minister or law officer who has taken a personal grip on the Bill. I urge the Attorney-General now to do so. In the few minutes available, I wish to make two points. The first is that the definition of "bribery", which takes up the whole of the first three clauses of the Bill, is unduly complex. In its report, the Law Commission rightly said that 95 per cent of the population—remember, that is more than 11 out of 12 of a jury—know instinctively what is meant by "bribery and corruption". The Director of Public Prosecutions, although he says that he supports the Bill, has written to the Joint Committee confirming that his inquiries show that in the past 15 years the straightforward words of the present legislation have caused no practical problems for prosecutors, and I can say from my personal knowledge, which goes back to 1979, that they caused no problem throughout that period. While overseas is a little different, the challenge with regard to bribery in this country has been not the legislation but the difficulty of getting hold of the necessary evidence and the need for fraud investigation group—that is, the Serious Fraud Office—type skills in presenting it. My point is that the long definition in the draft Bill is unnecessarily complex and in terms that only an experienced lawyer can disentangle. In defining one of the nastiest non-violent crimes on the statute book, it makes no mention of dishonesty. Its key ingredient is "impropriety", a word that in the Shorter Oxford Dictionary has around a dozen different meanings, only one or two of which approach criminality. "Improper" and "impropriety" are then subdivided in the Bill into a series of subcategories—good faith, impartiality, breach of trust, breach of a relevant expectation—all of which may indeed be criminal provided that dishonesty is present, but otherwise may fall short of criminality. Indeed, some, such as impartiality, may be perfectly proper, or at least within expected norms, such as a supermarket planning application that offers a more generous planning gain than its competitor. The second point concerns the effect of a conviction on an international business and the case for or against prosecutorial guidance. We received some evidence on that in committee. The harsh reality is that, quite apart from the proper desire to stamp out corruption, one of the major driving forces behind the real changes introduced by the Bill concerns international competition and the immensely competitive world of international trade, including the international arms trade in which we cannot escape the fact that the UK, the USA, Germany, France and others are very big players. Other major areas of business such as banking, mining, computers, medical exports and high-tech exports generally play a part. Pressure for this Bill comes rightly from those, and I am one of them, who deplore and wish to stamp out the huge amount of bribery that is alleged to have gone on in those fields. Pressure also comes from the USA, which led the world with its unfair commercial practices Act 1977, and from others, who can see us as trailing behind. But the OECD resolution to which we are signatories and our obligations under EU law that incorporate that resolution into our own law—it was sadly abused by Tony Blair when he intervened in the BAE Systems case—provide that any individual or business that is convicted of the bribery is thenceforward forbidden even to bid for such contracts, even if the conviction is the result of its voluntary self-accusation, which is encouraged. The USA and Germany have both devised schemes to avoid or at least reduce that effect either by so-called pre-contract clearance by prosecutors, as in the USA, or by a system of deferred judgment by the courts, which operates in Germany. How do the Government propose that the United Kingdom should tackle this issue to achieve a level playing field? I look forward to the Minister or the Attorney-General replying on those two issues and ask him or her, if they are not sufficiently briefed immediately, to write to me and to others interested in this Bill setting out the Government’s response. Those are only two of a number of important issues raised by the Bill. I hope to try to help in their resolution at Second Reading, in Committee and at later stages of the Bill.