The newly-formed National Crime Agency is developing its insight into construction’s “vulnerabilities” to fraud and corruption by working more closely with the industry’s professional institutes, including the CIOB.
The 4,500-strong NCA, which replaced the Serious Organised Crime Agency in October 2013 and has been called the “British FBI”, is using the partnerships to raise its own understanding of the industry as well as awareness of the risks among construction businesses.
The new dialogue has already resulted in an information-sharing Corruption in Construction seminar, organised by the CIC and held at the ICE on 27 March.
The NCA is understood to have identified construction as being at risk of crime and corruption after undertaking an “internal baseline threat assessment”.
In a statement for CM, the NCA’s Ken Gallagher said: “Addressing bribery and corruption remains high on HMG’s agenda, as confirmed in the Serious Organised Crime Strategy (SOCS), published by the Home Office in October 2013.
“Respondents to a recent survey conducted by the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) identified corruption in the construction sector as a significant problem globally. The NCA’s project on domestic bribery and corruption therefore focuses on sectors, including construction, where vulnerabilities to corruption have been identified.
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“Our knowledge-building around the threat posed to the construction industry by bribery and corruption has included linking in with trade representatives, such as CIOB, Construction Industry Council and Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors; this has allowed us to develop fuller understanding of the scale and scope of the problem. It has also proved an opportunity for the NCA to develop collaborative partnerships and this is essentially how the CIC seminar came about.”
Last October’s CIOB survey demonstrated that nearly half (48%) of the 700 respondents perceived that corruption in the industry is either fairly common or extremely common. And more than one in three (35%) said they had been offered a bribe or incentive on at least one occasion.
Tony Burton, the incoming chairman of the CIC and a senior partner at QS firm Gardiner & Theobald, told CM that the seminar was preceded by bi-lateral briefings. “What became apparent is that they’re saying ‘we don’t know very much about your sector of the economy, but we’re concerned the industry could be a target for organised economic crime and we can help you protect yourselves’.”
As Burton said, the traditional view of corruption in the industry is of individuals or businesses lining their own pocket, or procurement fraud, rather than organised crime attacking the industry.
But he said that the NCA’s focus appeared to be on protecting the industry from electronic crime of one form or another. “A lot of money moves around the industry, and are we able to recognise fraud and corruption, when the banks sometimes have difficulty? Is our sector properly prepared?”
As a result of the seminar, Burton said that the NCA and Serious Fraud Office would be working with the CIC and its member bodies to produce a “map” of the industry to identify processes that were vulnerable to crime.
“The warning was that criminal gangs can adapt quickly – if they were targeting the financial services sector a year ago, they could now be looking somewhere else.
“Construction is involved in large financial transactions, and is not as aware generally as an industry as the banking sector. The NCA was saying it’s on a learning curve to understand our industry, and is keen to work together with the industry to protect a significant sector of the UK economy.”
Burton said that the CIC would take the lead on collaborating with the NCA.
