Thousands of British businesses are oblivious to the impending Corporate Manslaughter Act, which becomes law on 6 April 2008.

Under the new Act, it is the organisation that will be prosecuted for a gross failure in the management of health and safety that causes death. Vulnerable and uninformed businesses that are successfully prosecuted will face unlimited fines coupled with a publicity order, requiring an organisation to publicise the fact of its conviction and certain details of the offence in a way specified by the courts.

Shockingly, companies in the capital and South East have the lowest awareness of all regions, with a third of businesses in London claiming to be unaware of the Act with barely half (44 per cent) prepared for it.

Similarly just over half of firms in the South East claim to not fully understand the implications of the Act on their business; and just 20 per cent of companies in this region are fully prepared for it, compared with 59 per cent in the South West and West Midlands.

Smaller businesses are particularly at risk. Just one third of companies with five or less employees understand the implications of the Act on their business, compared with over half of all companies with 50 employees.

“The new legislation is a wake up call to the many thousands of employers who freely admit to not understanding or even knowing about the new Act,” said Brian Nimick, CEO, of the British Safety Council.

“Our report reveals that around a fifth of businesses of all sizes and sectors – from sole traders and SMEs (small and medium sized enterprises) to companies with 500+ employees – have not heard of the Act, even though it becomes law in just three months’ time. Staggeringly this includes 40 per cent of civil service and public sector.”

In good news for fleets, cfc solutions, a fleet software business, said that those that are following existing health and safety guidelines have nothing to fear, and added that in their view the risks of prosecution have been frequently overstated.

Cfc business leader Andy Leech said that it will only be those that fall foul of their health and safety obligations that will be hit: “It is still possible to find fleets, especially at the smaller end of the scale, where health and safety knowledge is limited.

“These are the fleets that may, in the event of an accident, face the full force of the new corporate manslaughter law. Perhaps the large amount of publicity that the subject has received in recent months and will do so in 2008 as the legislation comes in effect, will lead them to take the action that their employees rightly deserve under the law.”