Compliance
The compliance with all legal requirements and internal guidelines is attributed great significance at Aurubis, because unlawful behaviour can cause immense damage and result in regulatory offences and criminal proceedings. In addition, there is also the danger of defamation of the group’s reputation and thus damage to the market position.
The term „compliance“ stands for acting in conformance with defined specifications or policies. These are laws, directives and internal guidelines, such as a Code of Conduct or Ethics.
Since NA acts through its employees, each employer is obliged to comply with the applicable law. In order to give the employees guidelines for law-abiding behaviour, NA compiled a Code of Conduct some time ago. The principles detailed therein apply in particular to dealings with customers, suppliers, other companies, shareholders, authorities, employees and superiors and, apart from forbidding anticompetitive behaviour and corruption, include the compliance with anti-discrimination directives, regulations on product and occupational safety and environmental protection.
The compliance with legal requirements and the Code of Conduct is ensured by prevention, controls and sanctions. Preventive measures are internal guidelines, the advising and in particular training of employees. For example, employees regularly participate in courses on antitrust and environmental topics. The Group audit, as an independent body, is in charge of the controls. It checks whether the legal requirements and internal guidelines are being complied with. If violations of laws, internal guidelines and the Code of Conduct are identified, sanctions under labour and criminal law will take effect.
In order to ensure even better compliance with the legal requirements and the Code of Conduct, Aurubis appointed a Chief Compliance Officer in November 2007, who is directly under the Executive Board in this capacity. The CCO has the task of anchoring the topic of compliance firmly in the corporate culture and of ensuring that the same rules apply for all the employees in the Group.
