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26 February 2010 / David Corker
Issue: 7406 / Categories: Opinion , Company
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Money talks

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The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) announced its “ground breaking global agreement” with British Aerospace (BAe) earlier this month. Under its terms, the company will pay £30m in return for the SFO terminating its prolonged investigation of it for overseas corruption.

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) announced its “ground breaking global agreement” with British Aerospace (BAe) earlier this month. Under its terms, the company will pay £30m in return for the SFO terminating its prolonged investigation of it for overseas corruption. Simultaneously the SFO’s counterpart in the US, the Department of Justice (DoJ) announced that the company had agreed to pay a settlement totalling £257m.

What is striking about both announcements is that there is no mention, let alone any finding, of BAe ever being involved in corruption. A gullible reader could be led to believe that BAe’s misdemeanour in the US amounted to nothing more than a number of misrepresentations to various parts of the US government in order to win contracts and, in the UK, to a relatively trivial Companies Act offence (s 221) of

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