Companies: Overseas Territories Registration

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Wednesday 20th April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, clearly, there is progress to be made on that very point. My right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer wrote to the G20 members last week with regard to the G5 initiative on the automatic exchange of beneficial ownership information, exactly in line with what the noble Lord proposes. The initiative is still very new, but we are going to start discussion with the overseas territories and Crown dependencies shortly and I hope that our EU partners will take note.

[Lord Naseby]

Since it is an international conference and we are in the chair, will the UK Government be pressing the US to explain and to rectify the situation where the states of Delaware, Nevada and Wyoming allow no transparency of information on any subject, to the detriment of our overseas territories? Undoubtedly, if that continues, we will see a loss of business from our overseas territories to those three US states.

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, we will be pressing all those who attend the conference to pursue greater transparency. We have made it clear that the global gold standard ought to be public, central registers of beneficial ownership. We will say that to our great friends and to those who are not perhaps such close friends but will be there and will, I hope, be our close friends by the end.

Safeguarding Children: British Overseas Territories

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

In this case, too, the noble Baroness raises an important issue of ensuring that those who are abused—the children—have a voice but that those who are the abusers are also able to seek information and be persuaded that that is not the behaviour which they should perpetrate. I know that a number of overseas territories have expressed a desire to establish a private and confidential counselling service for vulnerable children and young people, along the ChildLine model that the noble Baroness explained. With regard to working with adults, we can do that work through our support to NGOs and CSOs and also through DfID, in the support that we give to promoting education about the way to change adults’ attitude towards social norms.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

My Lords, is my noble friend aware that Her Majesty’s Government are to be congratulated on the relationship between the overseas territories and the relevant departments here in the UK? I speak from first-hand experience of the Cayman Islands, where I declare an interest—

Syria

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Tuesday 12th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

The danger is that Russia’s action may well have strengthened Assad’s hand and makes it more difficult, perhaps, for Assad to see the benefit of a peace process. That is why I call on Russia to use its levers of influence with Assad to make sure that he takes the transition process seriously and comes to the table on the peace negotiations. I believe that the Syria crisis conference can go ahead even before that peace has been achieved. It can show the way that we can achieve stabilisation in Syria in the future.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

Has my noble friend seen the report from the respected Carnegie Institute, which suggests that the southern front is the last key point for the Syrian rebels? As that front appears to be crumbling, does that not reinforce the point that somehow or other Assad has to be involved in the solution so that everyone can then concentrate on ISIS?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My noble friend points to the instability in the south of the country. This is really what was being referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, with regard to the fact that Russia has been involved in attacking civilians in opposition-held territory that is not Daesh. Assad is not part of the solution. It is certainly the case that he is a recruiting sergeant for Daesh. However, it is important that he sees the value for his regime to take part in the peace negotiations.

Overseas Territories Joint Ministerial Council

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Thursday 3rd December 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, progress is being made on gaining access for the National Crime Agency to information that is held. It is important that we continue to do that work in co-operation with the overseas territories. We have been making progress, and I shall give some examples, which may help the noble Lord, Lord Collins, as well. Gibraltar will implement a central registry of company beneficial ownership in line with the EU fourth money laundering directive. Bermuda already has a central register. The British Virgin Islands have agreed to bring all beneficial ownership onshore, and the Cayman Islands are introducing a centralised platform. Montserrat will implement a central register with the information publicly available—though, I recognise, on the payment of a fee. Fruitful discussions have taken place on developing a timely, safe and secure information exchange process to increase our collective effectiveness for the purpose of law enforcement, in which, whatever our party or none, we all have an interest.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

My Lords, in asking this question, I declare an interest as a member of my family works in the Cayman Islands. Is my noble friend aware of how welcome paragraphs 9, 12 and 16 are? Paragraph 12 states:

“It is not appropriate to refer to British Territories as ‘tax havens’”.

Furthermore, will she confirm in relation to paragraph 16 that “beneficial ownership information” is only,

“for the purpose of law enforcement”,

and nothing else?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, my noble friend is right to refer to the fact that the overseas territories involved in discussions about beneficial ownership are international financial centres, which is an appropriate way to describe them. My noble friend is right to point out that paragraph 16 refers to,

“technical dialogue between the Overseas Territories and UK law enforcement authorities on further developing a timely, safe and secure information exchange process to increase our collective effectiveness for the purposes of law enforcement”.

Piracy

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Thursday 16th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Naseby]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to address the incidence of piracy off West Africa, particularly against oil tankers.

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Anelay of St Johns) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government believe that the level of piracy off west Africa remains broadly stable year on year, but increased levels of reported kidnappings at sea have raised the profile of the issue. Piracy is one symptom of regional maritime insecurity. The UK is working bilaterally and multilaterally to address it through capacity-building initiatives in support of the 2013 Yaoundé code of conduct, which seeks to build and develop regional maritime security.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

Is my noble friend aware of the estimates from the US maritime agencies that the incidence has increased by 80% between 2010 and 2013? That involved 1,200 vessels and no fewer than 279 kidnappings. In the light of that, should we not use the experience that we all had in Somalia: in particular, first, ensuring that vessels themselves have defensive methods on all ships and that transponders cannot be switched off; secondly, ensuring that when there is an incident, the navies of the nations are there to arrive on the scene in good time; and, finally, that UAVs are made available to locate all sorts of vessels?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, it might be helpful if I explain to the House that although we are talking about piracy, the matter falls into two legal capacities, and some of the figures amalgamate the two. Of the criminal attacks taking place at sea, some are in territorial waters—which is where the majority of the real theft is done, from oil tankers anchored off Nigeria—but outside those territorial waters there are also kidnappings and thefts of a much lower amount. Perhaps I may give a general answer to my noble friend’s three major questions. We do not believe that it would be appropriate to take from our experience internationally in Somalia and replicate it in west Africa. First, most of the crime in west Africa is in territorial waters, and in the area covered—from Senegal right the way down to Angola—there are a range of functioning Governments who can implement their own efforts to combat maritime crime in territorial waters. Outside territorial waters, maritime crime clearly has less of an impact. However, international discussions are going on. My noble friend raises the point, “Why not arm?”. The Government and the UK maritime industry have made it clear that they do not wish to see private armed guards on boats, because another difference between Somalia and west Africa is the level of sheer vicious assaults in the latter area. In west Africa they are not afraid to kill.

Finance: Equity Markets

Debate between Lord Naseby and Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Monday 23rd April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Naseby]

My Lords—

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Peston, will realise that there have already been two opening questions from the Labour Benches. It is now only fair that we go to the Conservatives.

[Lord Naseby]

My Lords, does my noble friend not recognise—I am sure that she does—that in times of low interest rates investors look for short-term and long-term reports, and that they therefore as a whole look forward to the report from Professor Kay and recognise that very little was done by the previous Government to address this issue?