UK Law and Practice Contributed by: Neil Swift, Jasvinder Nakhwal, Charlotte Tregunna and Rachel Cook, Peters & Peters
• corrupt transactions with agents under the Preven - tion of Corruption Act 1906 and the Prevention of Corruption Act 1916; and • bribery of foreign public officials under the Anti- Terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001. The BA 2010 repealed the law relating to offences prior to 1 July 2011. The UK’s Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions Regula - tions 2021 empower the government to impose sanc - tions on individuals and entities involved in serious corruption, such as bribery and misappropriation of property. These regulations allow for asset freezes, travel bans, and prohibitions on making funds or eco - nomic resources available to designated individuals, and are established under the Sanctions and Anti- Money Laundering Act 2018. 1.3 Guidelines for the Interpretation and Enforcement of National Legislation UK enforcement authorities routinely publish guidance for the interpretation and enforcement of UK anti- corruption and anti-bribery legislation. Key examples include: • The Bribery Act 2010: Guidance by the Ministry of Justice, updated on 22 January 2025; • Joint SFO–CPS Corporate Prosecution Guidance by the Director of Public Prosecutions and the director of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), updated on 18 August 2025; • SFO Guidance on Corporate Cooperation and Enforcement in relation to Corporate Criminal Offending, published on 24 April 2025; • United Kingdom Anti-Corruption Strategy 2017– 2022, published on 11 December 2017; and • the British Bankers’ Association’s Anti-Bribery and Corruption Guidance, published in May 2014. Guidance for “Failure-to-Prevent Offences” The “failure-to-prevent offences” are a set of offences where an organisation can be held criminally liable because it failed to prevent its associated person from committing an offence. There are three such offences currently in force: failure to prevent bribery, failure to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion and failure to prevent fraud.
The Ministry of Justice is under a statutory duty to issue guidance to companies to assist them with accessing the statutory defence for these offences, namely that the organisation proves that it had in place adequate procedures designed to prevent per - sons associated with it from committing the offence. These duties are found in Section 9 of the BA 2010, Section 47 of Criminal Finances Act 2017 and Section 204 of the Economic Crime and Corporate Transpar - ency Act 2023 (“ECCTA 2023”). 1.4 Recent Key Amendments to National Legislation While there have been no consequential amend - ments to UK anti-corruption legislation over the last 12 months, there have been several key developments in this area. The identification principle was modified by Section 196 of the ECCTA 2023. Under Section 196, if a senior manager of a corporate entity or partnership, acting within the actual or apparent scope of their authority, commits a “relevant offence”, the corporate entity is now also guilty of the offence. The most significant development affecting offences of fraud is the implementation of the “failure to pre - vent fraud offence”, which took effect on 1 Septem - ber 2025. Under Section 199 of the ECCTA 2023, an organisation is liable if it fails to prevent a fraud offence from being committed where an employee or agent commits the fraud, and the fraud is intended to benefit either the organisation or a person to whom the employee or agent provides services on behalf of the organisation. The types of fraud captured are the following: • Fraud by false representation (Section 2, Fraud Act 2006) • Fraud by failing to disclose information (Section 3, Fraud Act 2006) • Fraud by abuse of position (Section 4, Fraud Act 2006) • Obtaining services dishonestly (Section 11, Fraud Act 2006)
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