Criminal Finances Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Nicholas Dakin and Roger Mullin

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 15th November 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Roger Mullin]

Q Are you satisfied it is working satisfactorily?

Anthony Browne: I know that, as the banking sector, we think that it is a lot stronger. It is very important to have a strong whistleblowing regime. It is an important part of improving the culture of banks and preventing wrongdoing. We have been working with the regulator on this, so you should ask the regulator.

Nausicaa Delfas: I agree that the regime has been strengthened. We regard it as very important. It feeds into work on culture in banks as well. I would be interested if you thought it should be further improved.

Amy Bell: I cannot comment, unfortunately, in relation to the financial sector. In relation to the solicitors’ profession, we do have in our regulations the obligation for people to report serious misconduct. We do not have any specific whistleblowing provisions but that is not something we have encountered an issue with.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

Q From the evidence we had this morning I formed the opinion that there is a view that banks are pretty good at spotting irregularities and bringing them forward to the authorities but other parts of the regulated sector are less proactive in that way. That seemed to be what was coming through the evidence this morning. Does that ring true to you? Are the measures in this legislation likely to improve the performance of other parts of the regulated sector?

Anthony Browne: We think it is important that the Government and law enforcement authorities use all the tools that they can to combat financial crime and not just rely on banks. I would agree with the assessment that banks do an awful lot; we certainly do an awful lot. It is important that you do not underplay or pay too little attention to other sectors—not just lawyers but accountants and estate agents. There are lots of different groups that get involved with this. They can all play their part against financial crime. We should all play our full part in that way.

Nausicaa Delfas: I agree with that. I obviously cannot speak for the other professions but we are aware that there are about 400,000 suspicious activity reports filed with the NCA each year. The vast majority of those, I understand, come from the financial sector. Obviously, perhaps more could be done. I go back to the point that that is a huge number. It is a quantity issue and we would urge any changes that could be made to improve the quality of those so that there are better leads for law enforcement.

Amy Bell: We have to be careful in judging the numbers of suspicious activity reports. The Financial Action Task Force and the NCA’s predecessor, SOCA, were both clear that there is no right number of reports. It is fair to say that the vast majority of reports do come from the financial sector. They see patterns of financial activity that we do not see. I do understand that there is criticism levelled at the professions in relation to reports about clients that banks report but maybe the professions are not reporting, but that is because we see different parts of the transaction. That should not be underestimated.

Although I think we should continue to be vigilant, we need to be very careful about drawing any conclusions from the disparity in the numbers. I think the information sharing will help because that means that the bank can communicate with the regulated sector where they see things that will give data to the professions to be able identify suspicious activity.