Submission on Corporate Criminal Liability

31 August 2021

The UK is too often a destination of choice for corrupt and criminal actors looking to spend and stash their ill-gotten gains, aided by professional enablers who face too few consequences for their own criminality. Outdated corporate criminal liability laws are one of the issues that facilitate such a situation, making it nearly impossible to hold large, complex companies to account for wrongdoing.

In our submission to the Law Commission of England and Wales, we argue that for reforms that bring certainty and clarity, fairness and equality before the law, and a credible deterrence for wrongdoing. These include:

• Replacing the identification principle with a form of vicarious liability for attributing criminal liability, with the latter more appropriate to the current reality of large, complex companies. There should be a defence of adequate procedures, but these must be more than a ‘tick-box’ exercise.

• Introducing a failure to prevent offences for money laundering, fraud and false accounting, drawing on the successful implementation of these offences for bribery and tax evasion to ensure consistency across the economic crime space.

• Ensuring that a system of criminal prosecution is not replaced with civil penalties, while recognising that these can have uses in certain circumstances.

These reforms will ensure that the UK’s reputation, security, and economy are better protected from the serious consequences of economic crime.