Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill

Debate between Jonathan Djanogly and Tom Tugendhat

Report stage
Wednesday 25th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat]

The question is at what stage do we bring a Bill forward—do we wait for it to be perfect or do we bring forward what we can get at a certain point? The right hon. Lady raises some interesting points. She knows my views on SLAPPS; indeed, in a former incarnation, I may have expressed them extremely clearly. She knows that we share views on asset seizures too. I should point out, however, that no common law jurisdiction has successfully solved the question of asset seizures, although many of us have tried and, indeed, some of us are in conversation with others to try to work out ways of doing it—forfeiture and seizure are not quite the same thing.

[Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Huntingdon) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Tom Tugendhat]

I will give way; I should have known that I was lining that up.

[Mr Djanogly]

Yes, because my right hon. Friend touched on asset seizures and tempted me. Of course, Canada has enacted an Act of Parliament that provides for freezing orders to be translated into seizing orders at the request of the Attorney General of Canada.

[Tom Tugendhat]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, but he is also no doubt aware that there is much discussion in the Canadian legal community about whether those orders will be challenged in different ways and how exactly they will work. There is still a serious debate about the nature of translating from forfeiture to seizure.

[Mr Djanogly]

My right hon. Friend is generous in giving way again. All this law is new: our unexplained wealth orders were new, and they have been questioned in the courts, so that is not the question. The question is whether we have the guts to stand up and move on this issue, as the whole western world wants to see.

Ukraine

Debate between Jonathan Djanogly and Tom Tugendhat

Tuesday 15th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Djanogly]

It has indeed, as I can say from a lot of first-hand evidence.

Sanctions against individuals will play an important role here. I saw how the Government were really getting it when they extended the Aeroflot sanctions to private jets. My next suggestion, as I have told the Minister before, would be to ban Russian yachts and planes from getting insurance. Sanctioning leads to asset freezes, so the Government will be left holding millions of pounds-worth of houses, boats and other assets, but what happens next? Will these assets be sequestrated and used for the benefit of Ukraine’s rebuilding, or will they be held to be returned to oligarchs after the war? The latter option may not be so popular, but it might be legally correct if we do not legislate further on this matter.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful argument on the use of sanctions and their importance abroad. Does he not agree that their use is also important at home? We are seeing dirty Russian money stolen off the Russian people being used by Putin in deliberate acts to undermine our national security, to silence voices in our country, to intimidate journalists and to disrupt the procedures of our courts. Does my hon. Friend not see that as a direct assault on the British people, being brought and paid for by Putin’s friends, with money stolen off the Russian people?

[Mr Djanogly]

Yes, indeed, and in every regard. I am very pleased that we are now addressing that. Many have addressed the question of helping Ukrainian refugees. I do not have time to go into that in detail today, other than to say that we need to be generous to these poor souls to the greatest extent that we can.

Finally, but no less importantly, we should now be preparing a significant Marshall-type plan for Ukraine. Once Russia is out of Ukraine, which must be the only outcome we can believe in, Russia should know that as much as it will be humbled by our sanctions, we shall also help to rebuild Ukraine and to put Ukraine into a better economic situation than it is in now. The days of pandering to Russia are over. The suffering of the Ukrainian people, of the Georgian people and of others, including Russians demonstrating on behalf of us all, must not go unrecognised. We must keep up this action.