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FCPA Flash Podcast – A Conversation With Robin Lööf Regarding Ten Years Of The U.K. Bribery Act

FCPA Flash

The FCPA Flash podcast provides in an audio format the same fresh, candid, and informed commentary about the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and related topics as readers have come to expect from written posts on FCPA Professor.

This FCPA Flash episode is a conversation with Robin Lööf (a barrister practicing at Fountain Court Chambers in London) regarding ten years of the U.K. Bribery Act. During the podcast, Lööf discusses the following topics: what is known and what is unknown after ten years of the Bribery Act; the impact of DPAs on Bribery Act enforcement including individual enforcement actions; and the long time periods often associated with Bribery Act enforcement.

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The U.K. Deferred Prosecution Agreement Regime: Aligning Rhetoric And Reality

SFO2

A guest post from David Corker (a Partner at Corker Binning Corker in London).

The cornerstone of the Deferred Prosecution Agreement (‘DPA’) regime in our jurisdiction is the centrality of the court. At the start of both his preliminary and final judgments delivered in the first DPA in 2015, Leveson P intended that his affirmation of this principle would become, as indeed it has, axiomatic. Almost every subsequent judgment endorsing a DPA has recited his words about the indispensable judicial role. Opening her 32-page judgment concerning the Airbus DPA in 2020[1], for example, Sharp P (Sir Brian’s successor as head of the Queen’s Bench Division) reproduced (paras 7 and 8) the relevant passages in full.

For this article this extract provides sufficient colour:

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An In-Depth Look At The U.K. Prosecution Of Airbus

airbus

These pages have long asserted that if a country is to have a deferred prosecution regime that the regime in the United Kingdom (which requires meaningful judicial review and approval) is far more preferable than the U.S. regime.

This is apparent when reviewing the Statement of Facts,, Deferred Prosecution Agreement and Approved Judgment relevant to the U.K. Serious Fraud Office prosecution of Airbus. (See here for a collection of the U.K. documents and see here for the prior post regarding the U.S. enforcement action). The U.K. documents provided a substantially more thorough and transparent glimpse into the underlying conduct compared to the U.S. resolution documents.

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Lisa Osofsky (Director Of U.K. Serious Fraud Office) Speaks On A Variety Of Topics

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U.S. enforcement officials are not the only ones who speak at FCPA conferences hosted by for-profit conference firms. (See here). “Foreign officials” do as well.

So let’s see, the conference firms are “domestic concerns” under the FCPA, a speaking slot is a thing of value, the foreign law enforcement official is a “foreign official,” and the thing of value to the foreign official helps drive attendance to the conference firm’s paid event. But, I digress.

Recently, Lisa Osofsky (Director of the U.K. Serious Fraud Office) delivered this speech at an FCPA conference and touched upon the following topics: SFO priorities, international cooperation, corporate cooperation and integrity, and the SFO’s use of technology.

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U.K. – Don’t Get Your Knickers In A Twist Regarding The Bribery Act Review

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As highlighted in this recent roundup, the U.K. House of Lords announced that it “appointed an ad hoc Select Committee to consider and report on the Bribery Act 2010.” The Chairman of the Committee stated: “now is the opportune time for post-legislative scrutiny.”

However, as noted in this article “non-governmental organisations reacted with dismay to the review by the Lords committee, saying that it should not lead to any rolling back of the legislation.” (See also here).

This post encourages those in the U.K. not to get their knickers in a twist. The post provides some historical context about the FCPA- namely that soon after the passage of the FCPA in 1977 the U.S. government undertook various reviews of the FCPA.

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