Bribery Act 2010

The Bribery Act 2010 comes into force next April. Corporate bodies may commit offences under the Act where a person performing services on the organisation’s behalf bribes another person with the intention of obtaining or retaining business for it. A bribe may be given where financial or other advantages are offered in return for the performance of a “relevant function” such as a public or business activity. A commercial organisation will not, however, commit an offence if it can show that it had “adequate procedures” in place to prevent bribery. The Ministry of Justice has just released a consultation paper – Guidance about commercial organisations preventing bribery (section 9 of the Bribery Act 2010) – the aim of which is to encourage procedures which commercial organisations can put in place in order to prevent persons associated with them from committing offences under the Act for which the organisation may be liable. Consultation runs until 8 November 2010.