Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, when she plans to create a public register showing the beneficial owners of overseas legal entities which (a) own or buy property in the UK and (b) secure contracts from central Government.

On 11 December the Government published its new Anti-Corruption Strategy. In the Strategy we have committed to publish a draft bill in this session of Parliament for the establishment of a public register of beneficial ownership of overseas legal entities.

The Department ran a call for evidence on this policy earlier in 2017. We will publish a response to the call for evidence early in 2018 and will also set out more detail on the timeline for publishing the legislation.