Anti-corruption: Beneficial Ownership Registration
Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Wallace of Saltaire
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, there are two parts to the question: what are we doing about public registers of beneficial ownerships, particularly in our Overseas Territories? First, we should acknowledge that we made huge progress in getting them to have registers at all in some cases. All the Overseas Territories and Crown dependencies will share information with our tax and law enforcement agencies. As regards the tower mentioned by the noble Lord, the Prime Minister made a commitment at the anti-corruption summit that we will have the first public register of foreign-owned companies owning property in this country, and that will apply not only to new but to existing ownership by foreign-owned companies. It will also apply to a public register of public contracting. Lastly, I should say that, as a result of the anti-corruption summit, 12 countries have either agreed or are agreeing to have public registers.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, can the Minister explain what sovereignty means in terms of our sovereignty over the Overseas Territories? The Prime Minister declared last year that we were pushing them to have public registers giving full transparency of beneficial ownership, and the Minister has now kindly said that we are making good progress towards accepting that our tax authorities can have access to them. That is half way there. If these areas are under British sovereignty and benefit from the recognition of UK law and UK accountancy, surely we have the right in certain instances to tell them what has to be done.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
The noble Lord is absolutely correct that in the last resort we could do so, but these are democracies and we think it is better that they agree to do things rather than we dictate to them, which is a rather 19th century attitude. At the same time, we acknowledge that we would like to have public registers and we are trying to persuade them on that. As I say, 12 countries have agreed so far, so we are making progress.
European Union Migration: National Insurance
Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Wallace of Saltaire
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, this is a well-worn theme from the noble Lord and it is slightly outside the scope of today’s Statement on the Office for National Statistics report, but I take his point and I am sure he will raise it again.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister recognise that this is not just a British problem? I have been sitting here thinking that I still have a US federal tax number—I am not sure about my US insurance number. And I am not sure from my three months working in Paris some years ago—during which, I have to say to the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, we put our daughter into a French school, thus increasing the strain on their system—whether I still have a French number, but this is the two-way aspect to it. No doubt the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, has all sorts of things in the French tax system—maybe in the French national insurance system—from residence there.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
I am not quite sure what the question was, but I am sure it was a wise one.
Tax Treaties: Developing Countries
Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Wallace of Saltaire(8 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Ashton of Hyde
The noble Lord is right. We want to achieve the same thing—to help those developing countries where we can. There has been a broadly bipartisan approach to this across the years. As for Malawi, this matter was addressed way back in 2010. Our aim is to have new double taxation agreements with developing countries where we can. There have been particular problems with Malawi that are not concerned with the detail of the treaty but with some of the more diplomatic issues. It is largely completed now but, as I say, there are some Foreign Office issues.
In general, it is our policy to conclude treaties with developing countries, and all new treaties that we manage to sign—these are bilateral treaties, so it takes two to tango—will include anti-abuse measures, exchange-of-information arrangements and assistance with the collection of taxes in both countries.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, given that we are preparing for the anti-corruption summit that the Prime Minister will chair in London in May, are we feeding the question of updating our tax treaties with developing countries into preparations for that? A lot of the loss to developing countries in terms of tax avoidance is filtered out through various corrupt practices. At the same time, are we considering in our relations with our own Overseas Territories pushing for greater transparency in the money that goes through the Overseas Territories, which is also closely related to this issue?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
Of course, we are trying to increase transparency. As the noble Lord will know, in our presidency of the G8, we led on international anti-tax evasion measures and we continue to work with the OECD. We were the first to sign the agreement for international exchange of information. As far as the anti-corruption summit is concerned, that is certainly something we will do. One of the problems, however, is that just increasing taxes in developing countries is not a silver bullet because of corruption: the tax that is raised has to go to the right places.
Immigration Bill
Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Wallace of Saltaire(8 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Ashton of Hyde
The Home Office understands that because it takes advice from the law enforcement agencies. Of course, we also take advice from my noble friend. It is not true to say that the Home Office does not recognise the security situation. In fact, the Home Secretary regards it as her highest priority.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, the noble Lord must clearly be too young to remember who abolished exit controls. It was indeed Margaret Thatcher, when Prime Minister, as an economy measure. She thought that they were unnecessary and cut the number of people employed by the border service. That was some time ago.
Lord Green of Deddington
Perhaps I may correct the noble Lord. Exit checks to Europe were abolished by the Conservative Government in 1994 and exit checks to the rest of the world were abolished by the Labour Government in 1998. Both decisions were wrong.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I tabled my amendment simply to make sure that the Government and, in particular, the Home Office took this point on board. I am very happy to talk further. We are looking for a response from the Government on this. Of course we recognise that 3,000 private airports cannot be entirely covered. One has to use intelligence. As the noble Lord replied, I was thinking of the days when as a schoolboy I used to dip sheep on a farm. The policemen always turned up to check that you were dipping the sheep properly. In those days, there were ways in which they made sure that the law was enforced in all sorts of places around the country. Clearly, we need a degree of intelligence.
The use of private planes and private helicopters is clearly growing. This is not a static situation. The Government’s response therefore cannot be entirely static. They have to be much more aware of what is going on and of the potential for abuse and for people who are engaged in illegal activities, possibly even terrorism, to use this route as well as many legitimate people.
The noble Lord did not mention the Channel Islands loophole. I have asked a number of Written Questions on it. I am struck that the liaison between the British Border Force and the authorities in the Channel Islands may not necessarily be as tight and mutual as we would wish. If one looks for areas where our border controls may not be entirely secure, the Irish land border and the Channel Islands maritime border are the most vulnerable. I will be interested to hear what the Government have to say on that in particular.
Above all, we need to be sure that the Government do not give the impression that there is one law for the rich and another for the rest of us. There are a number of other areas where the Government are edging towards a situation where unkind people, or Private Eye, could indeed suggest that there is now one law for the rich and another for the rest of us. I look forward to further discussions off the Floor with the Government. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, when I was in government I asked on a number of occasions how many British citizens hold dual nationality. We all know that we run into a number of problems with dual nationality, particularly when a British citizen of origin of another country is taken into custody in the country of origin. Dual nationality is a very cloudy concept. I should simply like to add that it would be very helpful if the Government would take this back and possibly even provide a Green Paper on the whole issue of dual nationality within Britain. We all have friends in that situation. I have a nephew and niece who hold British and Irish passports and a nephew who holds British and South African passports. My niece, who works for a development charity, sometimes finds it extremely useful not to be a British citizen when she is in a rather difficult country.
There are some major issues here. A substantial minority have British and Pakistani citizenship, and another substantial minority have British and Bangladeshi citizenship. These are delicate issues. They raise large public policy questions and some security questions. It would be useful if the Government would commit to looking at this matter further and reporting back to Parliament.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken. Perhaps I should first declare an interest in that one of my daughters has dual nationality. Indeed, she has two passports.
I start by saying that the noble Lord, Lord Green, very kindly asked me to ask my officials rather than answer his question. I certainly will ask my officials. Equally, I will take on board the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, and take them back to the department.
My noble friend Lord Marlesford has form on this question. I am conscious that I am but the latest in a long line of Ministers—“distinguished Ministers” is being whispered to me—including my noble friends Lady Anelay, Lord Taylor of Holbeach and of course Lord Bates, who, within a very short space of time, have answered the question put by my noble friend Lord Marlesford during debates on immigration Bills, counterterrorism Bills and in Questions in the House. As I said, I am just the latest in a long line and so, in hope rather than in expectation, here goes.
My noble friend will be aware from his long-standing interest in this matter that Her Majesty’s Passport Office requires holders of passports issued by another country to provide details of that passport at the time of application. He made the point that he understood that; the question was whether it would be on an electronic, searchable register. The reason for asking for other passports is to minimise the ability of the British passport applicant to obtain a British passport in a name and identity which is not consistent with an overseas passport. The holding of dual or second nationality is not in itself relevant to the issuing of a British passport. Instead, HMPO collects the information on any other passport held in order to help confirm the identity of the applicant. It provides an additional element of identity verification.
Therefore, requiring a British passport holder who holds or held dual nationality to supply information outside the British passport application process would be an unnecessary and additional function for HMPO. Failure to notify any acquisition or loss of citizenship would require an enforcement and penalty structure. This would in our view be disproportionate and likely result in legal challenges as the failure to notify would have no impact on the validity of the British passport. As I said, it is already a mandatory requirement for all applicants to submit any other passports that they hold, British or otherwise, when applying for a new passport. However, I can tell my noble friend that the Home Office continues to explore ways in which information held within the department is shared effectively to help to prevent and detect crime. My noble friend will be pleased to learn that HMPO is looking at enhancing how information at the point of application is collected and shared across Home Office agencies by making better use of technology. This would include information collected on dual national passport holders at the point of application. Information is held by the Home Office on dual nationals who apply for British citizenship and who subsequently apply for a British passport. Such information is necessary to progress the application for citizenship or when making jointly an application for citizenship and a passport. Outside of either process, the need for information on dual nationality would be unnecessary and would not serve any useful purpose.
Finally, I recognise that my noble friend has concerns about the security implications if his suggestions are not accepted, and I agree that the security of the public is of the highest importance. That is why we ask the views of the law enforcement agencies each time this matter is raised. Their response remains consistent—that the establishment of a dual national database is not considered operationally essential. Despite that, I fear that my noble friend will not be convinced by this response, but I hope that he will acknowledge that information on dual nationality is already collected and maintained. We do not see additional security benefit in extending the data collection process. I respectfully request that the amendment be withdrawn.