RECRUITER.CO.UK BREAKING NEWS - 17/12/2010
The Recruitment & Employment Confederation has today revealed
the findings of its investigation into anti-competitive behaviour
by seven recruitment businesses operating in the construction
industry.
The REC Professional Standards Committee (PSC)'s investigation
followed the four-year investigation by the Office of Fair
Trading (OFT) into breaches of the Competition Act, which concluded
in 2009.
According to a statement released this morning, the REC's PSC
issued a public reprimand against five of those recruitment
businesses. "This follows detailed conversations with each of the
businesses concerned and a robust review of the evidence provided
that measures have been put in place to avoid future breaches. The
reprimand will remain on their records for two years. Save for
expulsion from the REC, this is the maximum sanction available to
the PSC."
The five REC members are:
1. Anders Elite
2. Eden Brown
3. Fusion People
4. Henry Recruitment
5. Randstad CPE (incorporating the former Hill McGlynn & Associates
and Beresford Blake Thomas).
At press deadlines, Recruiter was awaiting for responses from the
companies involved.
All the above businesses concerned admitted to the OFT that they
breached the Competition Act. Having admitted their breach of the
Competition Act, the businesses listed above have all accepted that
they have broken the REC Code of Professional Practice.
Hays Construction and Property (Hays), which was also found by the
OFT to have breached of the Competition Act, and which was also fined
by the OFT, escaped censure. The statement said: "This is because Hays
was not in REC membership when the offences occurred and so the REC
cannot take any action under the REC Complaints and Disciplinary
Procedure.
"However," the statement went on to say, "Hays have participated fully
in our investigation and have reassured the PSC and the OFT that
they have taken all the steps necessary to fully comply with competition
law."
At press deadlines, Recruiter was awaiting a response from Hays.
The statement said: "The OFT found that all the organisations had
taken adequate action to ensure no repeat breaches were likely to happen.
Both the REC's Professional Standards team and the PSC have sought and
obtained assurances and tangible evidence that the businesses concerned
have put in place a comprehensive range of measures to avoid future
breaches. Specific actions include comprehensive reviews of internal
processes and procedures, staff training programmes and detailed
compliance audits."
Phil Westwood, chair of the REC's PSC, was quoted as saying: "We have
looked at these REC members very carefully. They all accepted that by
breaking competition law they also broke the REC's Code of Professional
Practice. Once this was established the PSC's role was to apply the
sanctions at our disposal. The PSC considered that on balance these
were isolated incidents and that all of the businesses had addressed
the short comings which created the offence in the first place. These
members had convinced both the OFT and the REC that they had learnt
their lesson and taken the necessary action to ensure that further
breaches of the Competition Act and the REC Code of Professional
Practice do not occur.
"This was a very serious breach and the PSC's role is to ensure
ongoing compliance on behalf of the membership. We decided to issue
this public reprimand which will remain on the businesses' records
for two years. Any offence by any of these members in relation to the
REC's Code of Professional Practice during this period would be treated
very seriously."
Kevin Green, REC chief executive, said: "This has been bad news for our
industry and our reputation has been damaged. We have investigated this
breach of our Code of Professional Practice in line with our Complaints
and Disciplinary Procedure. The PSC has taken the decision to publicly
reprimand these members for two years and that is the right decision.
"However the wider lesson for the industry is to recognise the
importance of ensuring all staff are trained to avoid anti-competitive
behaviour, and that compliance with competition law is built into
induction, training and company policies so that this will never happen
again."
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