We’ve just spent two weeks on holiday in the sun and we decided to pack Eoin O’Shea’s book ‘The Bribery Act 2010 – A Practical Guide’£95 from the publishers and available to buy online here.

Eoin’s book is a helpful guide for those wanting to understand the detailed provisions of the Bribery Act set against the history that led to the passing of the Act, including the Law Commission Review and the House of Commons debates (there were some contrary to popular belief…).

The book post dates the publication of the government guidance.

On the publication of the book Eoin was interviewed and said this about the book:

“It’s aimed largely at people in business, companies, international companies and companies which face any sort of a bribery risk, both companies in the UK and internationally, and also their advisers, their lawyers and other advisers who may not be specialists in this area but who need to gain an understanding of it. So, it’s aimed primarily at them. There are also, of course, the practitioners in this particular field who I hope may take an interest in the book and, of course, there are students who will hopefully be interested in it. The book also contains at the end a couple of sort of quite developed scenarios which can be used maybe for a teaching seminar or training purpose, so people training in anti-bribery compliance sessions that are sort of mushrooming now may also find that part of the book particularly useful.”

We agree.

The book is a useful guide which unpacks the specific offences under the Bribery Act, takes a look at the defence and looks at its territorial application. The provisions are dissected with hypothetical examples to bring them to life enabling readers to understand which provisions of the Bribery Act might impact their business in a practical way.

The book covers some related but non-Bribery Act criminal laws including accessory liability, the inchoate offences (assisting and encouraging, attempt and conspiracy) – related offences (for example POCA – one of our favourite hobby horses) and extradition are all touched on.

Only last week the use of inchoate offences to prosecute and convict was used to good effect after the UK riots in a case which attracted media attention.

Finally the book also highlights the civil liability ramifications of Bribery Act violations.  We have seen first hand the use of alleged illegal conduct in a civil context.

In a world where there is so much misreporting of the Bribery Act the book is a welcome addition.

For those responsible for compliance and putting in place Adequate Procedures to prevent bribery the book will be a valuable reference work.