Corruption, bribery and the rule of law

A few years back, as a trainee solicitor, I was asked to write an article / blog on the new Bribery Act just coming into force in the UK (Bribery Act 2010). Unfortunately I never quite got round to writing it and the moment somehow passed.

Bribery and corruption have never, however, gone off the agenda .  In the aftermath of this week's dreadful  Russian plane crash from Sharm el-Sheikh, it now seems possible, or likely, that a bomb in the hold was responsible for bringing the plane down.  On London's LBC phone in radio show  this morning, there were some anecdotes from tourists at the airport(s) in Egypt being able to bypass security with a bribe of as little as £20.  If these anecdotes are true, then clearly this points to a potential way in which a bomb could have evaded security and been placed in the plane's hold.  Further investigation will, hopefully, find out what actually happened.

This brought to mind an interesting discussion on global corruption I heard on BBC Radio 4's 'The Bottom Line'  back in June (podcast currently available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05xhyrr#play).  Evan Davis, the presenter, started the programme with a moral dilemma (don't you just love these?  Political philosophers have them in abundance).  You are at a foreign airport in a poor country on a business trip.  The queue for the passport desk is huge, more like a crush.  Then a smartly dressed man comes up to you and says, 'follow me, we can go to the express queue if you give me $10'.  What do you do?  a. Give him $10 and follow him gladly, b. Smile politely and decline his offer or c. Report him to the FBI for corruption.

This is central to the dilemma businesses face both in the UK and when operating internationally.  Cash exchanging hands in brown envelopes is rarely seen in practice.  What is more common is lavish hospitality or weekends away.  There might also be a 'facilitation' payment.  But at what point does a gift become a bribe?

Egypt was singled out in the discussion as a country where corruption was widespread, where facilitation payments were common and (it was alleged) the clique around the leader and his family were 'above the law' and not subject to the normal rules.  It is seen as impossible to do business in Egypt without a member of the ruling regime as a business partner, possibly paid a 'retainer' to facilitate local contacts.  There is, of course, a great culture of hospitality in Egypt and the Middle East, where relationships are often based on patronage and personal relationships.  Agreements with handshakes, 'my word is my bond', based on a network of social connections may all be commonplace.  But when does this hospitality, trust and flexibility in business based on social connections, become corruption?  It's sometimes a fine line.

The UK Bribery Act 2010 has universal jurisdiction - that is, it applies to UK companies operating abroad as well as foreign companies doing business in the UK.  It is among the strictest legislation in the world.  It introduced strict liability for companies and partnerships failing to prevent bribery, together with strict penalties for either bribing or failing to prevent bribery.  UK  companies therefore have to be very careful when doing business both in the UK and abroad to avoid criminal prosecution.

Ensuring that business is transparent and based on the rule of law, is vital to a country's economic prosperity - and potentially a country's safety and security.  In countries where corruption is rife, it costs the economy millions and keeps that country in poverty instead of prospering.

In India, the Radio 4 panel cited corruption in the telecoms bidding process which allegedly cost the Indian government £100 million equivalent.  That is £100 million not available to spend on vital infrastructure, healthcare and education.  Unemployment and collapse of infrastructure all can result from corrupt practices.  Prominent anti-corruption campaigners in India include Anna Hazare, who famously employs the Gandhian tactic of fasting to achieve publicity for the anti-corruption cause (www.annahazare.org).  There is also the website www.ipaidabribe.com to catalogue and highlight corruption in India.

The rule of law is not a principle of the West, to be foisted on other countries.  I am with Lord Bingham, when he comments that the law might sometimes be an ass, but most people would rather live in a country 'which complies, or at least seeks to comply, with the principle I have stated (ie. belief in the rule of law) than in one which does not'[1] - rich, poor, middling and emerging countries alike - with equality before the law as central.

The advice from the panellists on R4 included: do not accept anything, even a drink or a business lunch (takes away even the perception of preferential treatment), hold business meetings in an office and make sure any relationship with a supplier is with the company and not you as a person.

Next time in an airport queue, think very hard  before accepting any offer of jumping or bypassing the queue, however tempting.

[1] Tom Bingham,'The Rule of Law' 2010  p.9

www.ipaidabribe.com

www.annahazare.org

http://www.transparency.org.uk/

Beyond Bollywood - a riot of colour and dance

There have been a few Bollywood musicals on the London stage and some readers may have seen Bombay Dreams – a Lloyd Webber production – and Merchants of Bollywood – which we saw at the Peacock Theatre. With the recent launch of Beyond Bollywood at the London Palladium it was not an event to be missed.

The audience was pleasingly quite mixed. Indian / Asian families and couples were in the majority, and it transpired later many were Gujaratis who whooped at the Gujarati dances. In addition, there were many African-Caribbean and white families too, perhaps getting their first taste of Bollywood.

The plotline is quite simple: with the death of her mother, Jaswinder, a theatre owner and Kathak dancer, Shaily, a jazz funk dancer, leaves her home in Germany to find the roots of Indian dance in India and so save the theatre from aggressive promoters.

At each stage the audience are taken through various styles of dance from the Kathak of Jaswinder, jazz funk, and following Shaily’s journey through India in Rajasthan, Punjab, Gujarat, Orissa and discovering the dances around the Hindu festival of Holi, and using the Sufi tradition of Qawwali singers.

It was good to see the production embrace Indian regional differences and styles, as well as the main religions of Islam and Hinduism. Anyone familiar with contemporary Bollywood  will recognise the dance styles and the costumes

The four main leads: Ana Ilmi as Shaily Shergil, Mohit Mathur as Raghav, a Bollywood choreographer, Sudeep Modak as Ballu, his assistant, and Pooja Pant, as Shaily’s mother, Jaswinder Shergill, were all outstanding. Indeed one wishes Pant had been on stage longer; her movements and gestures were sublime. The accompanying chorus lines were also outstanding with barely a foot wrong in the whole production; they had to master a range of styles with fast costume changes necessary on occasion.

The music was a mix of familiar songs e.g. Jai Ho, from Slumdog Millionaire, and songs written especially for this production. And almost without fail the music literally hit the right notes, from the ballads to the more upbeat numbers.  The sets were amazing, using backlit screens, and easily transported the audience from Europe to India, and the various regions of India.

Beyond Bollywood embodies the spirit of modern Bollywood: the vibrancy, energy, costumes and music, and in particular, the ensemble dances as well as the virtuoso dances. My only criticisms would be that the show could have gone on for a further 5 minutes and perhaps would have benefitted from an encore that the audience’s standing ovation demanded. For me the production went far too quickly and kept me spellbound.

http://beyondbollywoodmusical.com/

A Rising Force? Asians in Politics

This last general election has been, at least at its denouement, the most compelling in recent times. The results, the nature of the government, and the identity of our Prime Minister were uncertain until the exit polls which many senior politicians did not believe. The “Portillo Moment” is now the “Balls Moment”.

For the Conservatives (Tories) the anxieties of an election campaign they thought they might lose have now morphed into the anxieties of actually governing in a continuing difficult economic environment with public spending cuts promised, and uncertainties about the SNP and an EU referendum. One need not be the Oracle or Akashwani to predict that the next few years will not be dull politically. It might be that the Tories will be in power for another 10 years with Labour and the Liberal Democrats having imploded, with beneficial boundary changes in the offing, the possibility of neutralising UKIP, and a strong economy.

At least with the end of the election campaign one will be spared photographs of the leading politicians at temples and mosques with their wives in Indian clothes, photogenic as they are, and with the men in headcoverings and patkas. One might wonder where the campaign stops at church services are; I think their absence might tell us a great deal about contemporary Britain.

Looking through the papers it occurred to me that apparently the Asian representation in Parliament has been changing and it might be good to examine that, and to focus on a few MPs. I did know that the first Asian MP had been Dadabhai Naoroji  in 1892. I am unsure of what other Asians had been elected prior to Keith Vaz in 1992, now the respected Chair of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee. There are a number of British Asians who have been elevated to the House of Lords from Karan Bilimoria, to Shruti Vadera and Sayeeda Warsi.

My relatively cursory examination of the detailed results of the General Election suggest that there were 24 MPs of Asian origin elected; 13 Labour, 10 Conservative, and 1 SNP. The Times of India reported 10 MPs of Indian origin after this General Election but this appears to exclude those of Pakistani heritage whom I have included.

Picking three Asian Tories it is interesting to compare their backgrounds. This week Priti Patel was made a Minister of State at the Department for Work and Pensions – not quite Cabinet level - and intriguingly she was in western clothes to meet the Prime Minister. Sayeeda Warsi was in salwaar kamez when she took the famous walk up Downing Street in 2005 perhaps making the point about her heritage. Of Gujarati origin Patel’s family moved to the UK from Uganda and ran a chain of newsagents. With a work career mainly in PR, and time with James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party, Patel is reputedly a “rising star”.

Sajid Javed has used his background to suggest that the Tories are a party of inclusion; he appears to make more reference to his father’s work as a bus driver than his origins from Pakistan. From a relatively ordinary upbringing Javid became a banker at Chase Manhattan. Javed has been an MP since 2005, a Cabinet Minister as Culture Secretary since 2013, and this week was appointed Secretary of State for Business, which should play to his strengths as a former banker. Unsurprisingly he is also regarded as a “rising star”.

By contrast Rishi Sunak comes from a relatively privileged background; the son of a doctor he went to Winchester College, Oxford, and Stanford. He is married to the daughter of a founder of Infosys, probably the leading Indian IT services company. Elected in the safe seat of Richmond, William Hague’s former seat, his political career seems assured.

Probably the Asian Tory MP with the most compelling career thus far is Rehman Chishti, who has represented Gillingham since 2010. A barrister, he served as an adviser to the late Benazir Bhutto, the Pakistani Prime Minister. He was also a Labour candidate before defecting to the Tories; one is reminded that Winston Churchill in his long political career also “ratted” or crossed the floor.

The Labour MP Seema Malhotra had a previous career as a management consultant and then a special adviser to Harriet Harman, now Acting Leader of the Labour Party. Rushanara Ali, of Bangladeshi origin, was raised in Tower Hamlets, went to Oxford to study PPE, and has been the Labour MP for Bethnal Green since 2010. Sadiq Khan’s father, like that of Sajid Javed, was also a bus driver, but unlike Javed Khan joined the Labour Party, and has been the Labour MP for Tooting since 2005. Khan is apparently considering running for the post of London Mayor.

There is a cluster of Asian Labour MPs in areas with large Asian populations. So, for example, the Mahmoods in Birmingham, others in Bradford and Bolton. The new SNP MP Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh has had a very colourful backstory. Her father is Pakistani and her mother Welsh/Scottish, and she was apparently a Bollywood star and recently a solicitor.

Unlike many others most Asian candidates had no family networks or the easy route through university and internships. Names such as Straw, Hurd, Kinnock, Rees Mogg, Tugendhat and Goldsmith on the lists of candidates make clear their familial connections. However many Asians have probably benefitted from positive discrimination particularly from Party headquarters, but most would have made it in politics despite such policies.

While the rise of Asians in politics in the UK should be welcomed their rise has not been without controversies. In April 2015 Lutfur Rahman was convicted of electoral fraud during his tenure as Mayor of Tower Hamlets and barred from office. In some constituencies there have been allegations of postal voting fraud and undue influence. There have been continuing controversies surrounding caste with the Electoral Commission investigating an electoral leaflet prepared by a Hindu organisation supporting a Tory candidate against a Hindu one. In addition, the campaign of Naz Khan in Bradford was mired in disputes with another candidate, George Galloway. The press have made much of photographs of candidates and their wives being separated in temples and mosques.

Followers of US political dramas such as The West Wing and House of Cards will know that black members of Congress and the Senate organise themselves into a Black Causus, voting en bloc in their own interests or in furtherance of their aims. Could a similar situation happen in the UK? It’s unlikely as MPs are more loyal to their parties – in the US the politics of race often transcend party loyalties.

Can one suggest that only someone of Asian origin can represent other Asians? No, because the interests of most voters are aligned, certainly at a high level. For most UK voters they want a country that is safe, creates the conditions for most to thrive, defends the NHS, educates its children, and offers a secure safety net. Where one might differ is generally in nuance: how much money should be given to the NHS, how should it be organised, what welfare should be offered, how can we better organise our schools? All while enabling business to create jobs and pay tax – usually.

But Parliament must be representative of our nation; its breadth and diversity. One has to stop thinking of our Indian and black representatives in terms of their colour but merely as our representatives; but I suppose you could argue I am doing exactly that in this piece. However, their continuing success in being elected for diverse parties, and taking part in the political process must be celebrated.

A Rising Force? Asians in Politics After the 2015 General Election

This last general election has been, at least at its denouement, the most compelling in recent times. The results, the nature of the government, and the identity of our Prime Minister were uncertain until the exit polls which many senior politicians did not believe. The “Portillo Moment” is now the “Balls Moment”.

For the Conservatives (Tories) the anxieties of an election campaign they thought they might lose have now morphed into the anxieties of actually governing in a continuing difficult economic environment with public spending cuts promised, and uncertainties about the SNP and an EU referendum. One need not be the Oracle or Akashwani to predict that the next few years will not be dull politically. It might be that the Tories will be in power for another 10 years with Labour and the Liberal Democrats having imploded, with beneficial boundary changes in the offing, the possibility of neutralising UKIP, and a strong economy.

At least with the end of the election campaign one will be spared photographs of the leading politicians at temples and mosques with their wives in Indian clothes, photogenic as they are, and with the men in headcoverings and patkas. One might wonder where the campaign stops at church services are; I think their absence might tell us a great deal about contemporary Britain.

Looking through the papers it occurred to me that apparently the Asian representation in Parliament has been changing and it might be good to examine that, and to focus on a few MPs. I did know that the first Asian MP had been Dadabhai Naoroji in 1892. I am unsure of what other Asians had been elected prior to Keith Vaz in 1992, now the respected Chair of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee. There are a number of British Asians who have been elevated to the House of Lords from Karan Bilimoria, to Shruti Vadera and Sayeeda Warsi.

My relatively cursory examination of the detailed results of the General Election suggest that there were 24 MPs of Asian origin elected; 13 Labour, 10 Conservative, and 1 SNP. The Times of India reported 10 MPs of Indian origin after this General Election but this appears to exclude those of Pakistani heritage whom I have included.

Picking three Asian Tories it is interesting to compare their backgrounds. This week Priti Patel was made a Minister of State at the Department for Work and Pensions – not quite Cabinet level - and intriguingly she was in western clothes to meet the Prime Minister. Sayeeda Warsi was in salwaar kamez when she took the famous walk up Downing Street in 2005 perhaps making the point about her heritage. Of Gujarati origin Patel’s family moved to the UK from Uganda and ran a chain of newsagents. With a work career mainly in PR, and time with James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party, Patel is reputedly a “rising star”.

Sajid Javed has used his background to suggest that the Tories are a party of inclusion; he appears to make more reference to his father’s work as a bus driver than his origins from Pakistan. From a relatively ordinary upbringing Javid became a banker at Chase Manhattan. Javed has been an MP since 2005, a Cabinet Minister as Culture Secretary since 2013, and this week was appointed Secretary of State for Business, which should play to his strengths as a former banker. Unsurprisingly he is also regarded as a “rising star”.

By contrast Rishi Sunak comes from a relatively privileged background; the son of a doctor he went to Winchester College, Oxford, and Stanford. He is married to the daughter of a founder of Infosys, probably the leading Indian IT services company. Elected in the safe seat of Richmond, William Hague’s former seat, his political career seems assured.

Probably the Asian Tory MP with the most compelling career thus far is Rehman Chishti, who has represented Gillingham since 2010. A barrister, he served as an adviser to the late Benazir Bhutto, the Pakistani Prime Minister. He was also a Labour candidate before defecting to the Tories; one is reminded that Winston Churchill in his long political career also “ratted” or crossed the floor.

The Labour MP Seema Malhotra had a previous career as a management consultant and then a special adviser to Harriet Harman, now Acting Leader of the Labour Party. Rushanara Ali, of Bangladeshi origin, was raised in Tower Hamlets, went to Oxford to study PPE, and has been the Labour MP for Bethnal Green since 2010. Sadiq Khan’s father, like that of Sajid Javed, was also a bus driver, but unlike Javed Khan joined the Labour Party, and has been the Labour MP for Tooting since 2005. Khan is apparently considering running for the post of London Mayor.

There is a cluster of Asian Labour MPs in areas with large Asian populations. So, for example, the Mahmoods in Birmingham, others in Bradford and Bolton. The new SNP MP Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh has had a very colourful backstory. Her father is Pakistani and her mother Welsh/Scottish, and she was apparently a Bollywood star and recently a solicitor.

Unlike many others most Asian candidates had no family networks or the easy route through university and internships. Names such as Straw, Hurd, Kinnock, Rees Mogg, Tugendhat and Goldsmith on the lists of candidates make clear their familial connections. However many Asians have probably benefitted from positive discrimination particularly from Party headquarters, but most would have made it in politics despite such policies.

While the rise of Asians in politics in the UK should be welcomed their rise has not been without controversies. In April 2015 Lutfur Rahman was convicted of electoral fraud during his tenure as Mayor of Tower Hamlets and barred from office. In some constituencies there have been allegations of postal voting fraud and undue influence. There have been continuing controversies surrounding caste with the Electoral Commission investigating an electoral leaflet prepared by a Hindu organisation supporting a Tory candidate against a Hindu one. In addition, the campaign of Naz Khan in Bradford was mired in disputes with another candidate, George Galloway. The press have made much of photographs of candidates and their wives being separated in temples and mosques.

Followers of US political dramas such as The West Wing and House of Cards will know that black members of Congress and the Senate organise themselves into a Black Causus, voting en bloc in their own interests or in furtherance of their aims. Could a similar situation happen in the UK? It’s unlikely as MPs are more loyal to their parties – in the US the politics of race often transcend party loyalties.

Can one suggest that only someone of Asian origin can represent other Asians? No, because the interests of most voters are aligned, certainly at a high level. For most UK voters they want a country that is safe, creates the conditions for most to thrive, defends the NHS, educates its children, and offers a secure safety net. Where one might differ is generally in nuance: how much money should be given to the NHS, how should it be organised, what welfare should be offered, how can we better organise our schools? All while enabling business to create jobs and pay tax – usually.

But Parliament must be representative of our nation; its breadth and diversity. One has to stop thinking of our Indian and black representatives in terms of their colour but merely as our representatives; but I suppose you could argue I am doing exactly that in this piece. However, their continuing success in being elected for diverse parties, and taking part in the political process must be celebrated.

E-commerce in India - the future?

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Last week I went a bit overboard – well it’s a normal week - and ordered numerous books – Amitav Ghosh in particular as I’m going to his book launch - and computer speakers,  so I could listen to my favourite podcasts. All this shopping arrived the next day, with the delivery company telling me to the hour when the shipments would arrive.  My street is full of delivery vans during the day and over the years I’ve come to know many of the drivers – they are invariably male – but despite that my name continues to baffle them.  Now Amazon suggests that it will be able to deliver packages the same day using drones, although I’m not quite sure how that might work on my central London street; perhaps platforms and chutes on my roof?

Our habits have changed. Internet shopping in the UK certainly is here to stay, certainly for books, clothes, and for some families for food, although I quite like the food shopping experience particularly at the ethnic shops and Quality Foods in Hounslow.

Some might say that this delivery revolution is a new phenomenon. However, my mother tells me that when we arrived at a new hospital in the UK – my father was a doctor – the consultant’s wife, if she was friendly and helpful, would introduce her to the local shopkeepers.  There would be generally be a local grocer, baker, fishmonger and butcher. At some point in the morning my mother would order by phone from the relevant shop, and in the afternoon a boy on a bike would deliver the provisions.  Payment wasn’t expected immediately but later. This doesn’t sound that different to the internet food shopping of today.

Some 20 years ago a cousin from Calcutta came to stay with us in Birmingham and I suppose she was shocked in a good way at the food, and the choices available, in our local Safeway.  On my subsequent trips to India, and without being aware of the social and political constraints, I felt that as the economy expanded invariably supermarkets in India would be a major growth sector.  I am reminded that apparently one of the reasons for Vladimir Putin’s continuing popularity in Russia, which liberalised economically at about the same time as India, is his perceived role in creating the conditions for new supermarkets to open.  For the Russians these supermarkets give them a choice that was not available under the old regime.

I always found Calcutta backward in its retail sector. There was in the past only one decent bookshop, Oxford Bookshop, in a city the size of London and magazines & periodicals were sold on the street. Yes there are more sophisticated malls now but Calcutta still does not have the retail sector a city of its size needs.

Sue and I both remember being in France in the 1970s and 80s and seeing the local Carrefour and Leclerc hypermarkets, which were of a different scale to supermarkets then in the UK.  Sue remembers France in those days being a 'foodie heaven' - with most hypermarkets stocking a huge range of cheeses, fish, fruit and vegetables unavailable in the UK at that time.   Most developed countries’ retail sectors moved in the same way. But now in the UK there is more of a focus on the smaller supermarkets such as Tesco Express, and Sainburys Local, as well as the emergence of relatively low-cost supermarkets such as Aldi and Lidl.  We appear to be in a post-hypermarket era, particularly as Tesco announces huge losses largely caused by write-offs in its property portfolio.

Now as Robin Pagnamenta reports[i] in The Times India is supposedly at the beginnings of an e-commerce revolution with investments from Amazon, and with local e-commerce rivals such as Flipkart and Snapdeal receiving some of $1b in funding. Clearly investors expect India, in terms of e-commerce to be the next Holy Grail.

Pagnamenta suggests that India, as with telecommunications moving from low landline penetration to 4G mobile, will leapfrog from a third world retail sector into the Internet e-commerce era without the intermediate “bricks and mortar” stage.  Up to now some 90% of India’s $500b retail sector has been dominated by backward local shops, shacks and carts. Any newcomers into the supermarket sector were discouraged by rules on local ownership, and shop size amongst others.  But as rules changed it was expected that global supermarket companies such as Tesco and Wal-Mart would enter the India market; they often had limited joint ventures ostensibly to learn about the marketplace but no serious inroads were made. It was often thought that the entry of these foreign operators would dramatically increase the range of produce, and ready meals perhaps available.

The supermarket entry narrative would suggest that the supply chain would be modernised so that food was no longer wasted on a mass scale. Figures are hard to come but perhaps 40% of all fresh food rots in India somewhere along the supply chain.[ii] The main reasons appear to be the lack of refrigeration, poor roads and corruption. I doubt any European or American supermarket would tolerate these levels of food wastage particularly as it would impact directly on their bottom line.

There are some indigenous supermarket chains such as Spencers, and Reliance Fresh but levels of penetration across India and amongst the middle classes appears to be relatively low. Why? Most homes still have servants, who could be sent shopping to the local markets, shops and shacks.  In addition,  if, for example, it is very cheap to have a cook then why spend money on ready meals?  And as we know takeaway food is available cheaply. Pagnamenta also suggests that with poor roads, few Indians would want to drive to an out of town supermarket despite its attractions.

Nevertheless with these investments as noted earlier it does appear that the Indian retail sector will be undergoing changes. Small grocers do already offer delivery as in the UK in the 1960s. Would a smartphone user order produce to their home? I’m not certain, especially as the market is probably a single person or a couple who could easily stop off on their way home as we now generally do in the UK. For the family with servants there seems to be no compelling reason to order food online. Some goods perhaps, electronics or books might work on an e-commerce basis.

If deliveries do become commonplace there will no shortage of willing employees to become drivers, but probably because of the risk of theft, and the low cost of labour most vans would have two employees on board thus negating some of the cost advantages. Drivers would need a level of initiative, literacy and IT awareness and for those with these skills there are many other opportunities.

I do wonder if this focus on e-commerce in India is misplaced. Food production and its supply chain needs to be overhauled and moving straight to e-commerce is not the way to achieve it. In the West the supply chains were already relatively smooth and e-commerce was offered from existing warehouses. Amazon began by siting itself next to a large book warehouse. Educated and middle-class Indians are still coming to terms with some changes in the retail sector and it seems too early to make the jump to e-commerce. Delivery drivers will be hard to recruit and they would have to cope with the same poor roads. Were I in authority, I would still want to encourage Western "bricks and mortar" retailers to enter the Indian market.

Photo: by Milei.vencel (Own work) Creative Commons

[i] The Times, 20^th April 2015

[ii] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28139586; http://www.foodnavigator-asia.com/Policy/India-damned-by-food-wastage-report