On November 2, 2017, the Irish Government passed sweeping legislation aimed at reducing fraud and just as importantly to increase the level of transparency in the way in which that fraud is combated. Ireland’s White-Collar crime package.
As an international speaker and consultant on fraud, Ireland’s White-Collar Crime Package greatly interests me. The “package” directly addresses a change to the environment in which several scandals had been allowed to rock the Irish business community and ultimately, the economy. It never ceases to amaze me that although the terminology and perhaps the organizational structures of various entities may change from country to country, the underlying root causes of unethical behavior remain remarkably the same.
I must also admit that I personally cheer these new levels of transparency not only as an ethics consultant but, let’s face it, my last name has some stake in the country’s reputation as well!
The White-Collar Crime Package
The sweeping components address bank, accounting, corporate and even social welfare fraud that have affected many aspects of Irish life. There are three major parts and sub-categories within the package itself. They are as follows:
- The initiation of a joint agency task force to ease the process of addressing all aspects of unethical behavior as it relates to what we know as white-collar crime. This is especially focused on fraudulent payment scams.
- The package has introduced two major legal pieces that were also enacted in November 2017. Briefly, they are the Criminal Justice Corruption Offences Bill and the Criminal Procedure Bill. We will be exploring the Criminal Justice Corruption Offences Bill in a future post.
- There has been a complete overhaul of the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement (ODCE). This overhaul is significant in that the ODCE will start its new life as an autonomous agency. The ODCE can recruit experts whose knowledge base can be matched to a particular area or aspect of a scandal.
As the transitioning from government to autonomous is such an interesting departure, from the norm it is important to discuss what the ODCE would be empowered to do in the case of unethical practices.
- The ODCE is empowered to improve compliance for all aspects of corporate activities up to, and including bringing fraudulent behavior into courts of law. As such, the Irish Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement can raise standards of compliance, influencing enforcement policies and reaching out to entities to ensure that stakeholders acknowledge what is expected of them.
- As an autonomous agency, the ODCE is empowered to identify misconduct and to then enforce serious violations.
- The ODCE as an autonomous agency is to be empowered to manage all of the funding and resources that it is given and to provide high standards of customer service to clients within, and external to government.
While these are exciting times for the ODCE, it is impossible from an ethical point of view to not worry about potential problems unless ethical training and reinforcement of that training is put in place. Realizing that all fraud – anywhere in the world – is based on opportunity, need and rationalization, I can see potential problems with autonomy unless strict guidelines are instituted in the New Year.
For example, as to just one aspect of the first point, the reaching out to entities “to ensure that stakeholders acknowledge what is expected of them,” who will maintain the standard and who will maintain an equivalent of the same laws in all cases? How can there be safeguards in place to make certain that those in compliance maintain complete neutrality?
In identifying misconduct (the second point above), what code of ethics is being applied by the autonomous agency to “identify misconduct” when it occurs? What ethical checks and balances are in place to monitor the oversight?
While the agency will manage its own funding and resources, what ethical rules and management will be put into place to create transparency as to how the funds are allocated?
In Dublin as well as Paris or Los Angeles, unless there are ethical expectations in place those doing the oversight are every bit as vulnerable to internal fraud as the entities they monitor. The newly reconfigured ODCE has a clear-cut choice. I hope they choose good ethics. Ireland’s White-Collar crime package
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