Five months from now a new law comes into force

From recent news coverage you are probably aware that as from 6th April next year­ the new Corporate Manslaughter & Corporate Homicide Act becomes law. It is considered legal opinion that prosecutions for corporate manslaughter will increase substantially as a result of the new powers.

What does the new law do?

Calendar In the event of a road fatality or serious injury, the police will investigate in accordance with guidelines contained in the Road Death Investigation Manual. In addition the police will also refer to the guidelines set out in the Health & Safety Executive’s guide INDG382 “Driving at work (managing work-related road safety)”.

Why is this different from the present situation?

Presently to convict an organisation of manslaughter following a work-related death, it must be proved someone senior in the organisation, often referred to as the directing mind, is also guilty of manslaughter. This makes prosecuting large organisations difficult. The new offence does away with the requirement for proving the guilt of a directing mind. In the future an organisation will be guilty of corporate manslaughter if death is caused by a gross breach of its duty of care that is substantially due to senior management failure. Thus the failures of a number of senior managers can be aggregated to prove the case.

What are you doing about it?

5 months to go The question is this: are you the person responsible for managing work-related road safety? If it is your responsibility and part of your job specification then you will be first port of call for any investigation involving a fatality or serious injury. Are you sure that you are doing enough?

What should you do about it?

You must be certain that whatever processes and procedures regarding work-related road safety are in place are robust enough to stand up to a comprehensive audit. RiskMaster can provide you with that level of comfort. To find out more please contact marcus@fsguk.com.

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