Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill

I apologise to my noble friend, but I urge a little caution with regard to the amendment. Quite a good test, which lawyers tend to use, is to see what happens if you put the prefix ““in”” in front of a word; in this case, that would make ““insubstantial”” and ““insignificant””. I think that ““significant”” is too weak here and that it is wise to stick with ““substantial””. I am a little worried about this offence; one worry was well illustrated by our previous debate. There is a widespread feeling in this country that if someone is killed by reason of ordinary negligence, not gross negligence, a serious criminal offence should be created and people—or, in this case, corporations—should be held to account in a serious criminal fashion. Unfortunately, we live in an uncertain world where there are a substantial number of deaths. I do not want to seem complacent, but in this country, there are a great many fewer than in other western countries and far fewer than in other parts of the world, and thank goodness for that. We have a well developed health and safety system, which we must not be complacent about and which meets a great many of our needs. We are looking here at the absolute upper end of responsibility, and we are doing it in relation to corporations. I am worried about what happens when a corporation comes before a jury and there is no individual to whom the jurors can relate when they think about whether it is fair to find a guilty verdict. If we make it too easy to get convictions, we will, in the end, devalue the whole currency. If an organisation or corporation is to be found guilty of corporate manslaughter or corporate homicide, it ought always to be seen as a very serious mark of disapproval, as it would be in the case of an individual. Nobody in this House, no sensible person, would wish to be found guilty of manslaughter and even less so of murder, obviously. We would be deeply ashamed, and rightly so. But if we create an offence in which it is not obvious to a jury that the management of the organisation and the organisation itself have fallen far below what is to be expected, we will devalue the currency. Boards of management and senior managers must do their best to look after every aspect of an organisation, but almost every aspect will be significant. The Bill is right in focusing not just on what is significant but also on what is substantial. I advise sticking with the present wording; it is a good idea to test it with the amendment, but I counsel keeping it.