Sanctions (EU Exit) (Miscellaneous Amendments) (No. 2) Regulations 2022

Michael Fabricant Excerpts

Tuesday 11th October 2022 General Committees

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Leo Docherty)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the Sanctions (EU Exit) (Miscellaneous Amendments) (No. 2) Regulations 2022 (SI. 2022, No. 818).

The statutory instrument before us was laid before the House on Tuesday 19 July 2022 under the powers provided by the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018, also known as the sanctions Act. Sanctions are of course a key pillar of our foreign policy. It is essential that our sanctions regimes are maintained and updated appropriately so that we can respond at pace to the activities of malign actors around the world. We have recently shown the strength and utility of our sanctions in our response to Vladimir Putin’s outrageous invasion of Ukraine and Russia’s crimes against the Ukrainian people.

The legislative instrument that we are debating today updates all our sanctions regimes, including those we are required to implement due to our United Nations obligations, as well as our own autonomous UK regimes. The regulations ensure that cryptoasset businesses fall within the scope of financial sanctions reporting requirements, strengthening our ability to respond to emerging threats and evolving global standards. Specifically, the regulations require cryptoasset exchanges and custodian wallet providers to report to the Treasury in the event that they encounter any designated persons in the course of their business or if they are holding any frozen assets on behalf of customers who are designated.

Cryptoasset businesses are also required to report any suspected breaches of financial sanctions. The regulations include new powers for public authorities to share financial sanctions information with the Treasury. The change ensures that a wide range of persons and organisations, from regulators to local authorities, have a dedicated information-sharing gateway.

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

I am delighted that my hon. Friend has given way. On cryptoassets, will he assure me that he or his Department will work closely with GCHQ on this? Without its help we will not know precisely what cryptoassets are being transferred by whom and to whom.

[Leo Docherty]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. We do of course have an intelligence-led approach to sanctions. The good thing about the regulations is that they will expedite the way we work in lockstep with Government agencies and the private sector.

Organisations will no longer have to rely on non-sanction specific gateways or on the Treasury’s powers to compel the release of information from partners. We expect that that will give organisations confidence to share information so that Government can better pursue breaches and uphold the integrity of UK sanctions. Those changes are possible thanks to the Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022, which amended the sanctions Act in March this year.

The regulations also make changes to our various sanctions regimes in order to update definitions and clarify intentions. Those amendments ensure that the definition of “designated person” is consistent across regulations. They include a correction of the reporting obligations relating to the transfer of funds to a ringfenced account. They clarify that within the Libya sanctions regime it is not a breach of sanctions to credit a frozen account with interest, and they specify that Treasury licences would be available for the purpose of satisfying prior obligations.

[Leo Docherty]

That is a very good question. I will gladly write to the hon. Member with the granular breakdown of the scale and depth of the response to that earlier consultation.

[Michael Fabricant]

It was pretty extensive.

[Leo Docherty]

I feel confident—my expectation is—that it was extensive to the degree that we did not need to do a second one. I look forward to writing to the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent on that.

These measures also correct acronyms that were entered incorrectly into the initial regulations or were missing. The name of the African Union peacekeeping force in Somalia is also updated. The regulations will ensure that our sanctions continue to hold to account corrupt officials, abusers of human rights and malign actors across the world, and that our UN sanction regimes remain accurate.

To conclude, the amendments mean that our sanction regimes take account of the most modern financial services and prevent loopholes being exploited in the future. I commend the regulations to the Committee.