Contributions
1,586 recent contributions in Hansard
HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q That is useful. Incorporation fees are ridiculously low at £12. The Treasury Committee recommended £100. Do you have a view on that? Nick Van Benschoten: I do not think they are…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q Briefly, how do you feel the measures in the Bill relate to the other measures around regulation in the Financial Services and Markets Bill? I am conscious that the two Bills…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q Thanks for that, it is really useful. Anti-money laundering responsibility has pushed over on to some of these trust or company service providers, which could be quite a…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)That is okay. No problem.25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q Okay. How are you weighing up the balance of those two? Martin Swain: It goes back to some of the things that I said about ease of doing business. There are two key parts of our…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q What more would you do to tighten up the company verification scheme proposed for Companies House? Would you put in place more measures to make sure that those registering…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q And Scottish limited companies have been used for various— Oliver Bullough: I did an investigation a while ago and there was a woman who was a director of four companies, I…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q As a brief follow-up, do you have any information on how much that cost is likely to be? That would be very useful to us. I appreciate you might not have that figure in front of…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q I want to ask about Scottish limited partnerships, particularly given their involvement in sanctions busting and various other things. Do you share my concern that they can…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q How exactly will the verification scheme that you propose work? Martin Swain: At the moment we are in the design phase for verification. I should say first of all that we will…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (First sitting)Q I have some questions for UK Finance about verification at Companies House. What would it take to have confidence in that verification system? You said in written evidence that…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q You also have multiple companies —in the hundreds—registered to single addresses. Would that also be an issue that you would like to see tackled? Bill Browder: In theory, yes.…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q You talked about persons with significant control and whether or not they are really the person controlling that company. There has been only one fine issued to somebody for not…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q Can I ask Oliver first whether the Bill could do more to deter the abuse of UK corporate structures such as limited partnerships, including Scottish limited partnerships, and…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q In the sense that the trust and company service providers and other supervisors are not doing their job properly, so that would stop those who are registering directly. Thomas…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q May I ask about the issues with the register as it exists? There are lots of things on it that are inaccurate, deliberately false or involving the misuse of people’s personal…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q I have some questions about whether the Bill is sufficient to deter the abuse of shell companies, limited partnerships or Scottish limited partnerships. Dr Hawley: We focused…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q Do you share my concerns that previous Bills to tighten things up—for example, for Scottish limited partnerships—have not been met with enforcement action? Since the changes to…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q There has been a growing trend of people setting up companies using someone else’s address and name. Presumably those will still exist on the register after this legislation…25 Oct 2022HANSARDEconomic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill (Second sitting)Q To who? Martin Swain: At the moment we are looking at two options. We are working closely with Government Digital Service and others on the potential for the Government…25 Oct 2022