Fatal attraction

Safety and government unpopularity may seem an odd combination for an article, but they go together at the present time. I previously suggested that a corporate killing law would come in 2003 ('Safety first', EMC, Dec 2001/Jan 2002). It has not come yet, but it has not gone away.

The original proposal by the then home secretary Jack Straw was based on two principles:

• companies as a whole would become accountable in criminal law if their safety performance fell far below the standards that could reasonably be expected;

• prosecutions could be brought against individual company officers if they showed gross carelessness or recklessness, and had thus contributed personally to the management failure that had caused a fatal accident involving their firm.

While Straw was careful to stress that the government did not wish to make conscientious firms so risk averse that they closed the business altogether, the general message was clear. The public's anger at work-related deaths could not be assuaged by inquiries or fines levied on large groups. Individual directors could expect to be prosecuted and if necessary, be sent to jail.

Straw's proposals were published shortly before the 2001 general election and Labour's manifesto for the campaign contained a pledge to introduce a corporate killing law. A few days after Labour's sweeping victory at the polls, I spoke at a conference organised by the British Safety Council. The keynote speech was by the newly appointed Home Office minister of state, Keith Bradley. He stressed that the government intended to legislate on this issue and it was quite a high priority. At the question session afterwards it became clear that there were many i's to dot and t's to cross before the bill could be presented to Parliament, which effectively ruled out the 2001/2 parliamentary session.

However, the proposal also seemed to have slipped from the 2002/3 session when the Queen opened parliament last November. The TUC and individual trade union leaders became extremely restive. Their fears were heightened when another consultation document appeared a few months ago. The government had clearly listened to the criticisms of the proposed legislation made by the CBI, other trade associations and employers. The revised proposals were considerably watered down. There was no longer any provision for the personal prosecution of individual company directors or officers, but only for the companies themselves.

This weaker version of the Labour manifesto pledge was the spark for the trade unions to put some serious pressure on the government. The TGWU prepared its own draft bill. While its leaders knew that such a bill could not pass because of shortage of parliamentary time, it was a warning signal to the government that its close allies outside parliament were dissatisfied. Individual MPs also began to rattle the government.

The Blair government is unpopular...It will lose Labour no votes to revert to a much tougher corporate killing law.

Purely by chance – and there is absolutely no reason to believe that the Crown Prosecution Service has reacted to external pressure – there has since been the decision to press criminal charges against individuals as a result of the Hatfield rail crash. This was a marked change of tack by the prosecuting authorities. The only previous successful prosecutions for manslaughter had involved tiny companies where one person was in charge or not large organisations where the controlling mind could not be established.

This is where politics come in. The Blair government is unpopular. The prime minister is enduring heavy criticism from his MP supporters, some of whom have publicly called for him to resign. In such circumstances, any government will look for political concessions to make to its own backbenchers. It will lose Labour no votes to revert to a much tougher corporate killing law. It would please the trade unions and backbench MPs, and be popular with tabloid newspapers and the public.

I expect the new law will come in next year and disappoint the CBI. The nearer the government gets to the general election, the less it will worry about upsetting employers.