Saturday, April 05, 2008

Corporate Killing Law in force from Tomorrow.

From tomorrow (Sunday) the new Corporate Manslaughter and Cooperate Homicide Act 2007 comes into force.

The TUC broadly welcome the Act. TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber is quoted as saying “'Too often in the past senior executives have been taken an overly casual approach towards the safety of their employees...... 'Although unions would have preferred to see the new law make individual company directors personally liable for safety breaches at work and for it to have introduced tougher penalties against employers found guilty of workplace safety crimes, we hope the Corporate Manslaughter Act will see the start of a change in the safety culture at the top of the UK's companies and organisations.

'The new law would be tougher if it were accompanied by a new legal health and safety duty on directors and a requirement on companies to report annually on their workplace safety culture.'

The safety pressure group “Centre for Corporate Accountability” (CCA) are disappointed that the Act will only apply to deaths that occur after April 5 (and all the evidence supporting the allegation must also take place after this date). This will mean that it will probably be at least until 2010 before any large organisation charged. In the meantime the old common law offence of manslaughter will still of course apply.

By co-incidence “Inside Housing” leads on a Police corporate manslaughter investigation into the high profile housing association “Notting Hill” and House builders, Barrets, following the death of 26 year old Elouise Littlewood. She died in her brand new “shared ownership” home from suspected carbon monoxide poisoning only 2 months after moving in.

It is also only 3 weeks before this years Workers Memorial Day.

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