Legal background Serious Fraud Office – pre investigation powers
The Criminal Justice Act 1987 (CJA) created the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and sets out its powers and the powers of the Director of the SFO. Section 1 establishes the Director’s power to investigate any suspected offence which appears to them to involve serious or complex fraud.
	Section 2 of the CJA sets out the Director of the SFO’s investigation powers, which are exercisable for the purposes of an investigation under section 1. These include powers to require a person to answer questions, furnish information, or produce documents. Failure to comply with such a requirement without reasonable excuse is a summary-only offence.
	Section 2A enables the section 2 investigation powers to be exercised at a pre-investigative stage, for the purpose of enabling the Director to determine whether to start an investigation under section 1 in cases of suspected international bribery and corruption.
	The Government intends to remove the limitation in this section which restricts the use of pre-investigation powers under section 2A to cases of suspected international bribery and corruption. This is to allow the SFO to use these powers in the wide range of high harm cases which fall within its remit.