All Hail the Anti Corruption App

Posted on by

Offered a dodgy deal in Dubai ?  Given an expensive Rolex as a present?   Pressurised to give a backhander to get your visa stamped? Taken out to a very expensive meal?

All these dilemmas might well face business people working to secure a contract abroad – or even now possibly in a few cases in the UK.

 Bribery  and corruption according to the  Institute of Business Ethics  is the top ethical concern now  for 80 per cent of major FTSE companies who might well be worried their staff could be tempted by an offer they can’t refuse.

Interestingly company action seems to have been boosted by the implementation of the Bribery Act in 2012 which makes it an offence for a commercial company to allow their employees to bribe other people on their behalf.
Companies are expected to have procedures in place and The Institute of Business Ethics neat solution is a free App which can be  put on any business phone – offering instant advice on what to do when you are put in a difficult position.

The App offers sane advice on how to handle the situation – including a sensible warning to pay up if you are threatened with violence- and report the incident later. Life in a foreign country is too precious to risk for the sake of a few pounds.

Details of the app and the toolkit on the Institute of Business Ethics website. 

IBE’s Director, Philippa Foster Back CBE OBE, says “Any one, at any level, in any organisation, can be offered a bribe. The SayNo Toolkit supports staff by giving them clear and easily accessible guidance about what can or cannot be accepted. Not only will the App provide an adequate procedure to combat bribery, it could also help to minimise the risks of corruption taking place.”

 

Two criticisms can be made.about the effectiveness of the new app. What happens if the firm itself – through either its legal or human resources department – turns a blind eye to what is happening.
The toolkit does not suggest going elsewhere or reporting it say to Public Concern at Work a charity which also can handle such issues and can help businesses manage such problems. The second is that it is not clear whether an individual employee could order one of these free apps if his or her firm does not go along with the scheme – which means people miss out on a valuable guide.
However the Institute of Business Ethics, a non profit making company, should be congratulated for a clever idea that might just help cut down bribery and corruption before it starts.

Vain Vince v. Bruiser Balls and Calamity Clegg

Posted on by

Vince on the prowl: pic courtesy BBC

Vince on the prowl: pic courtesy BBC

As we start gearing up to the next general election political parties always make extravagant claims that they will win. The reality at the moment is neither the two biggest parties – Labour or Tory – are likely to get an overall majority. The intervention of UKIP and the fact that the Liberal Democrats are likely to cling on in their strongholds – even if they lose seats – has seen to that.

That’s why the rather bizarre reconciliation between Nick Clegg and Ed Balls is particularly interesting. For whatever the  parties are saying publicly, everyone knows the Liberal Democrats will be talking to Labour as well as the Tories.And they will start worrying who is going to get what in any new coalition.

In  a story on Exaro News  earlier I illustrated this – from information obtained  from two independent  Westminster sources – one in the Labour Party and another in the Liberal Democrats – about the real reason why Ed Balls and Nick Clegg – who until now both publicly say they loathe each other – are kissing and making up.

 The answer is a premeditated power grab from Vince Cable, the current business secretary, to get  the chancellor’s job  from a somewhat unpopular Ed Balls. It appears according to both sources that the last thing Nick Clegg wants even if he were to remain deputy PM.

According to the Liberal Democrat source ” Vain Vince ” – once shadow chancellor for the Lib Dems – fancies the post but such a move would be anathema to both Clegg and Balls. Cable. The main reason is Cable’s tendency to keep things to himself . As the Lib Dem put it :

“It is no coincidence that Vince Cable and Gordon Brown were both young members of the Labour party in Scotland at the same time. They were very similar in keeping things to themselves,” said the source.

The insider recalled Clegg’s irritation with Cable as shadow chancellor. Clegg would complain to colleagues that he had to wait until Cable went on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme to find out what the party’s economic policy was on a particular issue.

While Balls interest would be to get Clegg on side fuelled by the fact that his leader, Ed Miliband is warming towards Nick Clegg after they regularly met socially at last year’s Olympics.

The ability of politicians to scheme like rats in a sack is one of the more unenviable sides of Westminster politics. Getting the electorate to trust politicians is one thing. The fact that they don’t trust each other – especially among people in their own party – is quite another.

 

 

 

Phone Hacking Trial: Brooks chatted to ex-husband, Editors voicemails accessed by Mulcaire – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

Fascinating that Mulcaire accessed Brooks’ and Coulson’s emails. Should learn to spell name properly though.

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

Rebekah Brooks at Leveson inquiryDay 53, Part 1: Rebekah Brooks asked to chat to her former husband about phone hacking a fortnight before the scandal about the interception of Milly Dowler’s voicemail hit the headlines.

View original post 599 more words

Second venue identified in Elm Guest House child sex abuse scandal

Posted on by

A  child sex abuse victim has identified a second house in the London borough of Richmond where children in care in the borough were taken en route to Elm Guest House.

The property in Avondale Road, Mortlake, has since changed hands but appears to be some sort of holding house for children in care who were taken out for the day.

The Met police have been informed about the existence of the property but it is not clear whether it is part of their  current investigation under Operation Fernbridge.

 A report by my colleague Mark Conrad on the Exaro website interviews  the victim who says that he knows of other children  taken to the property in the 1980s.

Elm Guest House is part of a current investigation but no charges have been brought against anybody for abusing children there. The guest house  was  at the time used by gays including it is claimed by MPs and other important figures. The Met Police have said that one of the visitors was  Sir Cyril Smith, the Liberal Democrat MP, who since his death has been exposed as a paedophile.

Phone Hacking Trial: Brooks agreed £200,000 deal with Max Clifford to settle hacking lawsuit – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

An amazing insight into insider wheeler dealing when you are facing a legal suit from a very powerful figure

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

Max CliffordDay 52, Part 2:  Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper group considered dispatching one of his favourite executives with a bundle of cash to settle a lawsuit for phone hacking, the Old Bailey heard today.

View original post 620 more words

Phone Hacking Trial: Police evidence of more than 6,000 NOTW “hacking calls”, trial hears – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

An extraordinary statistic from the Metropolitan Police. If correct it shows a truly industrial hacking operation.

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

News of the WorldDay 52: News International staff or contractors made more than 6,000 calls to voicemail inboxes before police smashed the phone hacking operation at the News of the World, the phone hacking trial heard today.

View original post 360 more words

Phone Hacking Trial: Glenn Mulcaire notes during Brooks editorship re-examined – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

Remember according to CPS files released at the trial hacker Glenn Mulcaire made £1m from News International over the years. This is some of his work from 11,000 pages of notes.

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

Glenn MulcaireDay 51:  Glenn Mulcaire carried out only a dozen hacks or attempted phone hacks during Rebekah Brooks’s editorship of the News of the World, the phone hacking trial heard today.

View original post 825 more words

Misusing deregulation to smash journalists’ freedom

Posted on by

One of the most precious freedoms for journalists is the protection of their sources. Now it appears the Cabinet Office is using an obscure bill – as part of the government’s drive to cut “red tape”- as cover to erode that freedom.
By changing the rules to allow the police to go to court to obtain reporter’s notebooks, pictures and computer files- without facing an open challenge from newspapers, TV, or even individual freelance journalists themselves – they are placing that protection in serious danger.
No wonder the Newspaper Society is up in arms and media lawyers are raising very serious questions. There is an excellent and elegant argument on the Inforrm blog by Gill Phillips,the Director of Editorial Legal Services at Guardian News and Media, about the dangers.
She rightly concludes: “This appears to be yet another backdoor attempt to limit and restrict essential and hard-fought journalistic protections.”
Bloggers should also be aware of this as it could affect them – and they will be much more vulnerable to a police raid- as they would be in a weak position to defend themselves. It is worth reading Vox Political’s blog on this point and taking action.

The official response according to my former colleague Owen Bowcott in the Guardian has been muted.
He reports :A Cabinet Office spokesman said: “Every measure in the deregulation bill is intended to remove unnecessary bureaucracy. Clause 47 would bring the Police and Criminal Evidence Act into line with other legislation in this area and would allow the criminal procedure rules committee to make procedure rules that are consistent and fair.

” However, the government has noted the concerns raised about this issue and Oliver Letwin is happy to meet with media organisations about this before the bill goes to committee.”
I think the government should go further and drop this now. It can hardly save much money and I think their motives in introducing this are questionable and undo good work under the Defamation act and by the Information Commissioners’ Office to protect journalists from interference by the police and the state.

Phone Hacking Trial: Sienna Miller, hacked phone messages “feasible”, trial hears – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

Sienna Miller’s testimony suggests the News of the World could have got the story through phone hacking – and the judge apologises to her for having to go through evidence about her private life to the court.

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

Law Miller CraigDay 50, Part 2: Sienna Miller said today that she probably would have left the sort of phone messages that a former News of the World reporter claimed he hacked with the knowledge of the paper’s editor Andy Coulson.

View original post 615 more words

Phone Hacking Trial: Former NOTW reporter insists Coulson hired him to hack phones – Martin Hickman

Posted on by

The disclosure about fiddling expenses does indeed happen. The question is did the story come from a source or hacking or both?

INFORRM's avatarInforrm's Blog

CoulsonDay 50, Part 1: A former News of the World reporter insisted today that Andy Coulson had hired him to hack phones. Dan Evans said he had told Mr Coulson, then the NoW’s editor, about his skills in voicemail interception during a job interview at a London hotel.

View original post 507 more words