Clause 16 - Offences by bodies corporate and scottish partnerships
Tobacco Advertising and Promotion Bill
2:31 pm
Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden, Conservative)
I am afraid I have turned a deaf ear to what is going on. It has been attempted before. Things must be given their proper time and it would be a dereliction of duty if we did not stop to look at what has been placed in the clause.
The more I have read the misleading assurance given in the explanatory notes that the enforcement provisions mirror what is in the Food Standards Act 1999, the more disquieted I have become. There are many differences between the two pieces of legislation, and I wish that I had not taken on trust what the explanatory notes said on the parallels between them.
Clause 16 deals with the officers of a body corporate. I seek an assurance from the Minister that an officer of a body corporate who is unaware of a tobacco advertisement displayed or produced by an employee of his company will not be liable to prosecution for the neglect referred to in clause 16(1)(b). It would be unfair if the production or display of a tobacco advertisement by an employee of a company made the managing director of that company guilty of an offence, even though he was unaware of the advertisement. If I read the Bill correctly, there is no defence for officers of bodies corporate who did not know, or had no reason to suspect, that the purpose of the advertisement was to promote tobacco, that its effect would be to promote a tobacco product, or that the advertisement would be published in the UK. Such a defence exists for those guilty of an offence under clauses 2 or 3.
Will the Minister make clear whether I have misread the Bill on that point? A number of exceptions are given. It is the style of the Bill to list the offences and then the defences, but there is not always an exact parallel between them. We have already discussed one amendment that would ensure that groups are not unwittingly left out of the series of defences that are proffered. I seek assurances for the officers of bodies corporate.