Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Mitchell and John Penrose

Tuesday 14th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

I want to thank my hon. Friend for all her work and commitment in this vital area. Who can doubt that she, like my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti) before her, is the very personification and essence of how this role should be performed? Last July we had an international ministerial conference to advance FORB and we always regularly raise cases of concern. On recommendation 6, she makes an extremely good point and the Government are considering it.

[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

13. What diplomatic steps he is taking to encourage adoption of beneficial ownership transparency measures by (a) G20 nations and (b) offshore tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions.

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Mr Andrew Mitchell)]

We are working with a range of jurisdictions, including G20 nations, and global financial centres to promote beneficial ownership transparency and to make it a global norm.

[John Penrose]

My right hon. Friend has a superb personal track record on this issue. May I urge him to redouble his efforts? Does he accept that transparency about who owns what means that oligarchs, kleptocrats and crime lords have fewer places to stash their dirty cash; that it is the single cheapest and most effective measure that any country can take to cut the social and economic costs that international criminality imposes; and that it becomes ever more powerful as the network of truly transparent jurisdictions grows?

[Mr Mitchell]

Open registers of beneficial ownership are extremely important. My hon. Friend and I, and indeed the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), did a lot of work on that from the Back Benches, and it is now Government policy. All overseas territories and Crown dependencies are committed to open registers. All have made voluntary commitments, and the Government intend to make sure that they stand by those commitments.