IRELAND should
increase its resources to detect and investigate foreign bribery more efficiently.
Resources have, in recent years, been largely devoted to investigating
non-bribery cases in the financial sector. Ireland has not prosecuted a
foreign bribery case in the 12 years since its foreign bribery offence
came into force, and law enforcement has taken few proactive steps to investigate
allegations, says a new report by the OECD Working Group on Bribery.
The OECD Working Group on Bribery has just completed its report on Ireland's
implementation of the Convention of Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials
in International Business Transactions and related instruments. To improve
Ireland's fight against foreign bribery, the Group recommends that Ireland:
• Urgently reorganise law enforcement resources to ensure credible foreign
bribery allegations are investigated and prosecuted;
• Consider how to apply cost-effective and simple detection and investigative
steps at the earliest opportunity to more actively enforce Ireland's foreign
bribery offence;
• Proceed with its reform of anti-corruption legislation and use this opportunity
to consolidate and harmonise inconsistencies between Ireland's two foreign
bribery offences that could be obstacles to effective enforcement, and review,
on a high priority basis, Ireland’s law on corporate liability for foreign
bribery; and
• Harmonise the confusing plethora of legal provisions on whistleblower protections,
to encourage reporting of foreign bribery allegations.
The report also highlighted positive aspects of Ireland's efforts to fight
foreign bribery. Ireland has broadened the forms of bribes and expanded the
categories of foreign public officials covered by the foreign bribery offence
in the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Act 2010 (POCA 2010). Under POCA
2010, Ireland now has jurisdiction over foreign bribery committed abroad by
Irish companies and nationals. The sanctions for false accounting offences
have increased under the Companies Act 1990. And the Department of Foreign
Affairs and Trade has been raising awareness among its staff of the Irish foreign
bribery offence and how to report possible violations of this law to law enforcement.
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