Company ownership: transparency and trust discussion paper

Business success, and therefore economic growth, depends on investors, employees, consumers and the wider public having confidence in business. When companies do business with each other, those transactions must also be built on trust.

An effective and trusted system that identifies and deals with poor business behaviour reassures people that we operate fairly, and encourages honest entrepreneurs to invest in activities promoting growth and employment.

This paper considers a range of proposals to enhance the transparency of UK company ownership and increase trust in UK business. This will help:

• prevent illegal activity
• better enable companies to be held to account
• provide businesses, investors, employees and consumers with confidence that companies are acting fairly