Alan Brown
Main Page: Alan Brown (Scottish National Party - Kilmarnock and Loudoun)Department Debates - View all Alan Brown's debates with the Home Office
(6 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Wallace
The Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, which is coming through the House, will give us new and more tools to deal with such behaviour. When the Criminal Finance Act 2017 transited the House and people made the point about the Magnitsky amendment, I pointed out that it was against criminal assets, and when the sanctions Bill comes forward, we will take steps to address the issue. So we raised this problem long before it was an issue in the sanctions Bill—last year, during the passage of the 2017 Act. Overall, we are determined to tackle this and to send the right message. The hon. Lady will have heard the long list with which I tested your patience at the beginning, Mr Speaker, and I find it ironic that the Labour party, which came up with precisely almost nothing in government, is criticising this Government, who are actually capturing proceeds of crime and taking them away from bad people.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
The laundromat scheme was first exposed in The Independent in 2014, and since then The Herald newspaper in Scotland has done excellent work highlighting the use of Scottish limited partnerships in that process. Given that the Government are now listening to my colleagues’ calls for action, can the Minister confirm a timeframe for legislation to address SLPs?
Mr Wallace
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We are determined to try to deliver on that. The work is being led by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and the Home Secretary and I are pressing the case to give hon. Members more solid answers about exactly when we will deal with it. I pay tribute to The Herald. Throughout all this, it has often been journalists who have made the difference in exposing all sorts of corruption around the world—and some have paid for it with their lives—which is one reason the Conservative party think that press freedom is so important.