UK passes new Qui Tam Law

whistleblower@labovick.com (Brian F. LaBovick, Esq.) — Sun, 27 May 2007 11:09:45 -0500

What do they say about imitation? Isn’t it the best form of flattery? Well the English, have been flattering us since we won our independence back in the 1700s. Their most recent bit of flattery/imitation is the creation of a Qui Tam law which creates a financial incentive to report fraud on the government.

Previously the laws in the United Kingdom permitted the private citizen to bring an action for fraud on behalf of the government. However, the private citizen had no right to share in any of the government’s bounty. Based on that statement alone I am sure 90% of my readers said to themselves, “Who in the heck would ever report any fraud?” In other words, we are, for the most part, capitalistic in our motivation to report fraud.

But, believe it or not, there are people who will actually sue to simply stop the fraud. Those people I affectionately call the “Crusaders.” The Crusader is zealous in their desire to stop the negative activity. It turns out that the English are pretty similar to us Americans.

In England the people who would use the old law were pretty much the Crusaders. Crusaders are almost always bound together in an organization that pursues the crusade. Take environmentalists for instance: many environmental groups will litigate over issues that have no monetary significance. The group is simply committed to its own cause and agenda, say the gopher tortoise or some unique owl. The group does not, for instance, want Johnny’s Development Corp. to tear down the trees and kill the owls and turtles. That is what the English Qui Tam law was about.

The new UK Qui Tam statute will carry far more incentives for the private citizen to report fraud then the old law. I am curious to see what happens in the future. It is my bet that the number of whistleblower claims they have pop up sky rockets. Remember that for every dollar the government now spends on Qui Tam cases they get a return on that investment of almost 15 dollars. Now that is a good investment of time and money.

Click Here to read more on the new UK Qui Tam statute from a recent article in The Times UK.

Brian

UK qui tam statute - Whistleblower Law Blog

UK passes new Qui Tam Law