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Bribery Bill [HL]

I support what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, has just said. Would the Minister like to think about it? If there is a case against a company that is charged with an offence of strict liability—very unusual in criminal law—and it puts forward as part of its defence that it was relying on procedures that it had read about in some book or other, written by somebody with some authority and experience in the area, the judge can easily tell the jury to ignore all that. There is no force behind what an individual has written in a book or set of procedures. There is no force behind anything like that. It is very different if the guidance is under a statutory power and the judge must tell the jury that it must take into account the fact that procedures which have statutory backing were relied on—or that is the defence—by the company that stands before it, charged with a strict liability offence.