Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2022

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble and learned Lord, who has just given the Government some wise advice which I hope the Minister will carry back to his colleagues.

We welcome the sanctions and look forward to the arrival of the economic crime Bill when it comes from the Commons the week after next. That has flushed out quite a lot of advice and some very strong comments from people who have been looking at the area of economic crime and kleptocracy in this country. One of the threads coming through, which goes back to the issue of what we can do now to stem that flight of capital, is that we are not fully using the anti-money laundering laws that we already have on statute in order to do that now. Will the Minister agree that more can be done with current legislation, which can be used to help stem the flow of money stolen from the people of Russia? Does he undertake to redouble efforts with all the bodies that have the power to use these anti-money laundering laws to get on and do it?

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I welcome these measures on behalf of these Benches and I thank the Minister for maintaining contact and giving advance notice.

These are both the culmination of weeks of lobbying from Parliament to have sight of further measures but also, as noted in this short debate—including by the Minister—the start of a process. They are of a differing character, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Clarke, indicated. Perhaps these are now of a more strategic nature which will be medium and long term, and perhaps they will have a different characteristic from the sanctions regime that we have put in place, which is different from what the EU scheme envisaged.

The noble Lord, Lord Austin of Dudley, rightly raised a number of weeks ago with the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, in the Home Office, why, as my noble friend Lord Fox indicated, we had not been using existing legislation. It has been highlighted for a number of months that the weak point in the global efforts against money laundering and kleptocracy is in fact the UK. Therefore, questions such as that of the noble Lord, Lord McDonald, are quite right. There is a niggling fear that the UK is still behind the US and the EU in making sure that there is, as the Foreign Secretary said a number of weeks ago, no place to hide for kleptocrats. However, as we have seen, because the Government have now, due to persuasion from Parliament, brought forward the first of the economic crime Bills, there have been, regrettably, plenty of places to hide.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

With regard to China and the position of the UK, as the Minister will know, the UK is a global hub, not only for oil trading but also for shipping and for insurance of that global shipping. Especially with Russia and China, insurance—I think the noble Lord, Lord Collins, referenced insurance, but I did not pick up what the Minister had said about that—for shipping is one of the key elements in doing real harm to the Russian oil and gas sector. A lot of it is brokered through London. Can the Government please outline what they intend to do about this sector?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, the specifics of shipping—the noble Lord had also raised wider issues such as bullion—are very much part of our thinking. On shipping specifically, the noble Lord will know that we have already taken the lead. My right honourable friend the Transport Secretary introduced certain measures that restrict the movement of Russian vessels and their landing in UK ports. The noble Lord is right to raise the broader issue of insurance and the hub and the role that the United Kingdom plays. We will be taking further measures in this respect and the details of them will follow.

As I have said throughout this whole process, as these measures are coming in, it is a very fluid situation. We are working as quickly as we can. There is the legislation in front of us that we are approving today—I hope that will be the case—and other measures already under way, some announced and some not. I do not want to pre-empt them. However, the noble Lord is quite right to raise the shipping sector. I hope that the steps specific to that sector that we have already taken indicate the Government’s route in terms of our intention to work further to limit, as the noble Lord says, the effectiveness of Russian activity in that sector.