Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, if he will make an assessment of the adequacy of legislation on tackling (a) tax evasion and (b) illicit financial transactions in British Overseas Territories; and what estimate his Department has made of when full public registers for British Overseas Territories will be published.

The Overseas Territories (OTs) work to uphold international standards such as those set out by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the Financial Action Task Force on tax transparency and countering illicit financial flows respectively. Responsibility for implementing their recommendations into legislation is a matter for OT governments.

At the Joint Ministerial Council last month, I confirmed the UK Government's expectation that OTs implement full Publicly Accessible Registers of Beneficial Ownership (PARBOs). Full PARBOs have already been introduced in Montserrat and Gibraltar, and commitments were made by the Falkland Islands and Saint Helena to introduce these by April 2025. Saint Helena has recently passed the relevant legislation.

Anguilla, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands and the Turks and Caicos Islands committed to implement Legitimate Interest Access Registers of Beneficial Ownership which offer the maximum possible degree of access and transparency whilst containing the necessary safeguards to protect the right to privacy in line with respective constitutions, at the latest by June 2025.