Company Directors: Identification

Lord Fox Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)]

I am afraid that I will push back slightly on the noble Lord’s point. We have had extremely high degrees of collaboration with the overseas territories. We are now very clear on who the beneficial owners are of land in this country, and, as I said, we have just completed a consultation that will allow us to go further in ensuring that everything is extremely transparent. I truly believe that real progress has been made, without impinging on the ability of legitimate businesspeople to open companies, run their businesses, make profits and grow the economy.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, I agree with the Minister that some progress has been made, but a great deal more is required. There are somewhere between 4.5 million and 5 million companies registered with Companies House, and they also need to be cleaned up. Can the Minister tell us how Companies House is getting on with that and when we will know for sure that all those companies are what they say they are?

[Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)]

I appreciate the noble Lord for pointing back to my previous answer about the 12,600 or so companies that have had their identities checked, expunged, changed or verified. That is clearly a significant starting number, which we expect will increase over the next year or so as Companies House deploys the £50-odd million that we gave it to introduce new systems to hire new people. That goes hand in hand with the 475 new economic crime prevention officers we have hired and the £400 million we have dedicated to fight economic crime between 2023 and 2026.