A timetable for legislation and further details is now expected to be announced this autumn. Emphasising the Government's strong commitment to legislate for victims of corporate killing David Blunkett has said:
"There is great public concern at the criminal law's lack of success in convicting companies of manslaughter where a death has occurred due to gross negligence by the organisation as a whole.
Reforming the laws on corporate manslaughter is part of the Government's wider agenda to modernise the criminal justice system - putting victims at the heart, protecting the public and ensuring that justice is done.”
It is currently very difficult to secure a manslaughter prosecution against an incorporated organisation following a death at work. However, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) are bringing many more cases.
The Home Office last issued a consultation on proposals for a new law of Corporate Killing in May 2000 (link 'B')
and also produced a draft Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA), the results of which still being assessed but the Government says that preliminary indications are that the costs of a change in the law will not be large.
EEF consulted widely on the original proposals (and the RIA) and submitted a substantial and robust response.
While EEF supports the principle of a new offence for those businesses which show a wanton disregard for the safety of employees, we have serious reservations about how it will work.
We had been concerned that making individual managers personally liable for the offence of corporate killing would lead to the scapegoating of those individuals and the abrogation of responsibility for health and safety matters by others in the undertaking, leading to lower rather than higher safety standards.
More recently the Government acknowledged our concerns and suggested that the proposals would no longer contain offences for directors and therefore custodial penalties will not be introduced.
Introduction to the EEF response
The EEF is committed to improving health and safety in business. We welcome initiatives aimed at raising standards of health and safety and reducing the number of fatalities in the workplace. However, UK performance in safety has improved dramatically over the past 25 years to such an extent that we are now world-class performers in terms of minimal serious workplace accidents.
The EEF recognises that existing legislation can make it difficult for corporations to be held criminally liable for deaths at the workplace. We accept the need for a change in the law to make undertakings properly accountable for deaths in the workplace, where the undertaking’s performance falls far below that which could be reasonably expected in the circumstances.
To see full EEF response - see link opposite.