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Financial Crime: Legislation

My Lords, that is what was said, but the description of the transport tax being moneys paid to officials in small amounts to enable goods to be imported into those markets amounts to small bribes. I do not accept that they are acceptable. It is to be conceded by those who take our position that there may be a cost to that strict position, as my noble friends Lord Hodgson and Lady Wheatcroft point out. However, if it is a cost, it is a short-term cost, with the prize of a long-term business environment that is clean. The enforcement of the anti-bribery convention internationally and the Bribery Act in this country is a prize worth gaining. The delay has been damaging to the reputation of this country and its business. As my noble friend Lady Williams explained, there is great anger with the United Kingdom in the United States and in the OECD. In the United States, the very strong legislation in the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which is rigorously enforced by the SEC and other federal enforcement agencies, has brought about a complete change of approach. The United Kingdom’s performance has been seen as hopeless and the delay in passing the Act has been seen as worse than that. Meanwhile, we have regular reminders of the extent of the problem. Noble Lords have referred to the British Aerospace scandal and, in particular, to the previous Government’s extraordinary decision to stop investigating the Al Yamamah contract for the sale of aircraft to Saudi Arabia. The emergence even now of further evidence, which was highlighted in the past few days by my right honourable friend Sir Menzies Campbell, of a $70 million payment in connection with the contract makes the point We have recently had the MW Kellogg engineering case, with a £7 million settlement over a contract for a gas liquefaction plant in Nigeria after payment of more than £100 million in bribes by the parent company. We had the disgraceful Innospec case last year, where a British company had paid bribes of $17 million to secure sales in Indonesia of a highly toxic lead fuel additive that is banned in the UK and elsewhere, the bribes having been paid to prevent the chemical from also being banned in Indonesia. The list goes on. The evil of corruption is a cancer in our international trading system. It must be removed. The anti-bribery convention and the Bribery Act are powerful instruments. In Richard Alderman we have an energetic and effective director of the SFO, but we need the Bribery Act to become law. The guidance is needed fast. It needs to show a commitment to thorough enforcement. It must not be said that it waters down the effect or the effectiveness of the Act. Only in that way can Britain’s damaged reputation for probity in international business be restored.