Sentencing For Corporate Manslaughter and Health and Safety Offences Causing Death

In anticipation of the coming into force of the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007, the Sentencing Advisory Panel (the Panel) issued a Consultation Paper on Sentencing for Corporate Manslaughter to the Sentencing Guidelines Council (the Council) in November 2007. The Council are again consulting on this controversial topic and has today published its own Consultation Guideline entitled “Corporate Manslaughter & Health and Safety Offences Causing Death”.

The Council have not adopted all of the recommendations made by the Panel, most notably the proposal on the level of fine to be imposed. The Panel’s provisional starting point for an offence of corporate manslaughter (committed by a first time offender pleading not guilty) has been suggested as a fine amounting to 5 per cent of the offender’s average annual turnover during the three years prior to sentencing. After taking into account any aggravating or mitigating factors, the court would then arrive at a fine which would normally fall within the range of 2.5 to 10 per cent of the offender’s average annual turnover.

The Council, however, have concluded that this formulaic approach could inadvertently risk an unfair outcome. The Council has therefore proposed as a starting point a level below which a fine would not normally be expected to fall - if convicted of corporate manslaughter, the Council would propose that the appropriate fine would seldom be less than £500,000, and may be measured in “millions of pounds”. This is a far more flexible approach than the Panel have proposed, and indeed largely reflects the current position adopted by the courts. The Council state that, with regard to impact of any fine imposed, whilst the effect on employment of the “innocent” may be a relevant factor, the effect on shareholders, directors and prices will not be considered relevant.

Since aspects of the approach in the consultation guideline differ from that proposed by the Panel, the Council has opened a further Consultation. Responses to the Consultation should be received no later than 5th January 2010.

For more information and to view the Consultation Guideline please go to:
http://www.sentencing-guidelines.gov.uk/