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Bribery Bill [Lords]

This discussion touches on an important issue. The system that we are setting up and, in particular, the way in which the Serious Fraud Office has been working are undoubtedly intended to encourage companies to come forward and admit wrongdoing if it has taken place, and to accept that penalties that will flow from it, but also, in doing so, to mitigate the offence. The system is thus much more like a regulatory regime than any system we have had before. I think that a difficulty will arise if it is perceived that there is no effective framework in which that interplay can occur. One of the aspects of the Bill that will raise anxieties is the fact that, in a rather English way, we are enacting adversarial criminal legislation which, if it is to work properly, will require a regulatory framework involving an understanding of the commercial world in which some of the decisions will be made.