The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published its report on the UK's implementation and application of the OECD convention on combating the bribery of foreign public officials on 30 March 2012.
The report found that the UK has 'significantly boosted' its foreign bribery enforcement activities since the OECD's previous report. The OECD found that the UK has made substantial efforts to raise awareness of the implementation of the Bribery Act 2010 and the specific offence of bribing a foreign public official.
The report concluded that this has led to heightened awareness of foreign bribery related issues in the UK. The OECD's findings also concluded that the Serious Fraud Office ("SFO") has 'significantly' increased its enforcement against foreign bribery.
However, despite these great strides, the report found that the UK needs to increase transparency when resolving cases involving foreign bribery. The OECD is concerned that the UK authorities are increasingly relying on civil recovery orders rather than criminal plea agreements to resolve cases, thus requiring less judicial oversight. The report also voiced concerns that confidentiality agreements entered into by the SFO are preventing the disclosure of key information after cases are settled.
The report made a number of recommendations, including:
- Taking steps to ensure that SFO and police resources to tackle foreign bribery cases are adequate;
- The FSA and SFO should coordinate enforcement action where appropriate and the SFO should ensure that it investigates allegations of foreign bribery and prosecute, where appropriate, regardless of whether the FSA take regulatory action; and
- The SFO should establish clear procedures and criteria for communicating with organisations concerning their conduct.
The UK is required to report informally on its efforts to implement these recommendations within 12 months and then has to submit a written report within two years detailing the steps it has taken to implement all the report's recommendations.
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