ECA questions corporate manslaughter proposals

The Electrical Contractors’ Association (ECA) has today (Thursday) admitted its concern that the government’s legislative proposals for corporate manslaughter will only apply to the UK.

The new legislation aims to achieve justice in the case of gross management failings where there has been a fatality at work. It seeks to replace the existing common law offence of ‘manslaughter by gross negligence’.

Under the new law, a company could be guilty of corporate manslaughter if ‘the way in which its senior managers managed or organised its activities caused a person’s death’.

Although the ECA agrees that the proposed Bill looks like a significant improvement on current law David Pollock, ECA director warned: "Unfortunately, the Bill does not deal with the international nature of employment. This is a growing issue in the problem for service industries, with the many foreign-based contractors now working in the UK.

“In addition to developing this Bill, the government needs to start the ball rolling in the European Union to ensure that foreign-based companies can also be properly held to account."

Pollock continued: “The proposed offence of corporate manslaughter should be related to a major or continual failure to assess and control risks rather than a temporary gap in the management system.

"It needs to apply clearly to organisations with ‘atypical’ employment arrangements, such as employment and labour agencies, and holding companies who may not employ anyone but still command the resources and arrangements in subsidiary companies”.

ECA health and safety advisor Paul Reeve wants the legislation to be clear about the level of responsibility a company has to take for the acts or omissions of contractors, sub-contractors, agency workers, or other organisations that employ workers.

“We agree that the police should investigate and the Crown Prosecution Service should consider whether to prosecute”, said Reeve. “However, any prosecution should be supported by close co-operation with the Health and Safety Executive. Sharing technical information and evidence following an incident would help to quickly establish if there has been a gross failure to comply with safety law.”