Ford was alleged to have decided that fixing the problem or recalling the Pinto would deeply cut into profits and decided that it would be less expensive to pay any damages awards that might result from civil suits filed by consumers, before it made its later decision to recall. What?
"Corporate manslaughter" has suddenly been thrust on the agenda in New Zealand.
In Parliamentary processes there is a late run to potentially include in the protracted Health and Safety Reform Bill, corporate manslaughter provisions.
Justice Minister Amy Adams said she had asked Workplace Relations Minister Michael Woodhouse consider including a new corporate manslaughter in the Bill.
In Minister Adams' opinion there needs to be a clear pathway for prosecutions against corporates in the event an employee dies from serious health and safety failings.
The idea of a "corporate manslaughter" provision in New Zealand emerged after a task force reported following the Royal Commission of Enquiry into the Pike River Coal Mine tragedy.
That task force had recommended that the criminal manslaughter offence be extended to corporations, which would mean invoking criminal liability to a corporation where two or more individuals of the required seniority with the company engaged in conduct that, had that been the conduct of one person, would have made them personally liable for the offence.
The difficulty of course with consideration of whether a corporate can murder or wrongfully kill someone is that the company itself cannot be locked up. A 17th Century Judge famously said "Companies have a soul to damn, but no body to kick".
Even in the extreme cases, like the Pinto case, executives are hardly ever jailed.
Successful prosecutions involving jail sentences as opposed to fines typically involve small "one man band" corporates with one "controlling mind", like Peter Kite in England who was directly in charge of an outdoor activity centre who was jailed for three years when four teenagers drowned following a canoeing tragedy.
The executive from bigger corporate entities seems to always escape jail sentences, making the impetus for legal reform here questionable in practical terms, "window dressings" aside.
The existing Health and Safety legislation caters for fines against corporates for "failing to take all practicable steps to provide a safe place of work" anyway, so is a law change necessary? The debate will continue.
¦Jol Bates is a civil and employment litigation lawyer at Brown & Bates. He and his partner Libby Brown are contactable at jol@brownandbates.nz or libby@brownandbates.nz about any thorny legal issues
