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The founding director of the Serious Fraud Office, Charles Sturt, says a Government decision to scrap the SFO will endanger the investigation of political hot potatoes and make life too easy for white collar criminals.
Mr Sturt - who was director of the SFO from its inception in
1990 until he resigned in 1997 - says disbanding the SFO and giving its job to a broader-based police Organised Crime Agency was a "retrograde step" that would "destroy the effectiveness of the fight against white-collar crime".
The Government announced the change this week, saying it was setting up a new, national Organised Crime Agency, to be led by police and to deal with all types of organised crime under one umbrella.
Attorney-General Michael Cullen said the emphasis of the SFO would remain in the new body, but Mr Sturt says he doubts this could happen.
"The police focus is on street crime of whatever form, and the focus of the SFO and its attack on corruption would simply take a back seat.
"To relegate the function of the SFO to part of a police unit whose prime purpose is to tackle organised crime involving primarily drugs and gangs is difficult to reconcile.
"In fact, it's appalling."
He said placing SFO-type investigations under the police also endangered the independence required to conduct them when they were politically loaded - something particularly crucial in investigations of fraud or corruption by MPs themselves or by people with high political connections.
While the SFO was a government body, he said, the Serious Fraud Act made the Attorney-General "responsible" for it "but not in charge of it", and it was free of political interference.
"Independence is vital, I can't emphasise that enough, in the exercise of the duties of the SFO director, especially in alleged corruption investigations and all SFO high-profile cases.
"I believe this independence will not be found in a merged situation under the police umbrella."
Announcing the change, Minister of Police Annette King said concentrating the investigative powers for all organised crime - including drugs, money laundering, cyber-crimes and identity theft - would prevent duplication of resources and skills.
She said investigations of the type done by the SFO would continue to take place.
It made sense to place its role under the police, which already took the lead role in dealing with most organised crime.
She expected many SFO staff - a mix of forensic accountants, lawyers and investigators - would also transfer to the new agency, which would be fully established in a year.
Mr Cullen said the SFO was a creature of a time of high levels of white-collar crime following the stockmarket crash of 1987.
