In separate written submissions to the commission, all three called for Australia's laws on foreign bribery to be changed to allow companies to make deferred or non-prosecution agreements with authorities for lower-scale bribery-related incidents.

Australian law requires police to either lay criminal charges or take no action at all, unlike the UK and US, which allow companies to reach settlements with authorities.

Given corruption investigations are slow, extremely difficult, often global in scope and costly to pursue, the Australian Federal Police has made just two prosecutions since foreign bribery was made illegal in 1999, and there are just 14 ongoing investigations at the moment, nine of which have not been publicly disclosed.

BHP, which was stung in the US over its sponsorship of the 2008 Beijing Olympics hospitality for foreign officials, was recently fined $US25 million ($A36 million) in the US for breaching the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, has the most recent experience with bribery allegations.

A six-year investigation by the US Department of Justice was dropped, while the US Securities and Exchange Commission review resulted in civil charges, but no findings of bribery or corrupt intent against BHP for its decision to invite stakeholders to the Chinese games.

The US regulator rapped it over the knuckles for its inappropriate internal controls, but the AFP is still plodding through its investigations, as it is with several other investigations, for example construction firm Leighton Holdings (now CIMIC).

BHP says the whole process could be simplified and sped up if Australia adopts a US or UK model.

BHP improved its anti-corruption processes in 2011, and says it has a zero-tolerance to bribery and corruption, but BHP said there is a tension between "the desire to provide certainty and retaining the flexibility needed to adapt to different situations" under the criminal code.

It says deferred prosecution agreements or non-prosecution agreements are not for all corporate criminal prosecutions, because "if a corporate entity commits a serious foreign bribery offence, it is essential that a just and transparent punishment is imposed on the entity, so that the public interest is served", but the methods used elsewhere work to improve overall governance for smaller issues.

Such agreements allow a company charged with foreign bribery offences to be given a period of time to pay a fine, admit to material facts and make changes to ensure the offending does not happen again.

A company must also promise full co-operation with authorities into the future.

If all of this is achieved, prosecutors will drop the criminal charges.

BHP also supports the removal of the facilitation payment defence.

It bans the practice, and says availability of the defence can lead to a lack of clarity as to what is and is not permitted in respect of payments to foreign officials , and it says it would not adversely impact the competitiveness of Australian companies.

Others argue facilitation payments are not bribes, but useful ways of expediting a licence renewal.

Woodside and Shell echoed BHP's calls in their own submissions.

Woodside said it would be difficult, if not impossible, to comprehensively stamp out bribery of foreign public officials while Australian laws continue to condone the making of facilitation payments.

Woodside also called for a new offence to be created for "failing to prevent" bribery, which could be defended by a company highlighting its anti-corruption policies and practices.

"In Woodside's view, the introduction of these measures would further serve to dissuade Australian companies and individuals from engaging in bribery overseas, and provide additional incentive to develop and implement robust governance processes for the prevention and detection of bribery," the company's senior legal officer Michael Abbott wrote.

In March Woodside revealed it had sacked seven staffers for minor fraud-related incidents last year.

Shell agrees scrapping that the facilitation payment defence is "problematic".

"The defence causes legal uncertainty for Australian businesses interacting with foreign officials. Shell already prohibits facilitation payments," Shell wrote.

It supports Australia adopting the US and UK models, and would also support the adoption by Australia of the broader scope of the UK's Bribery Act, which extends not only to bribes paid to public officials but also to commercial bribery among private citizens.

But it says the new laws should not impose uncertainty or unnecessary regulatory burdens, such as through inefficient or unnecessary reporting regime.

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has been critical of Australia's handling of foreign bribery matters in the past.