Turner Little looks at the news that David Cameron has warned that London is “not a place to stash your dodgy cash” in his fight against money laundering.
Corrupt foreigners have been warned by David Cameron that London is “not a place to stash your dodgy cash”, as he claimed that the capital’s property was being used as a haven for money laundering. The Prime Minister, who was speaking in Singapore, has vowed to crack down on shady overseas companies buying up luxury properties, as part of his drive to defeat international corruption.
Cameron’s pledge
Last week Cameron unveiled his plans to unmask the owners of British properties bought through “anonymous shell companies”, in an effort to flush out the foreign criminals who are fuelling Britain’s housing boom.
This autumn, the Land Registry will publish the data it holds on properties bought by overseas companies for the first time ever. Cameron hopes that the movement will expose the scale of international ownership in full.
Britain has been heavily criticised for being a haven for international money laundering but Cameron believes it is now the time to lose this reputation. He insisted that it was time the country “gets its house in order” and that they will no longer tolerate “dirty money”.
London ‘an easy target’
Purchasing high-value mansions in the capital with anonymised offshore accounts has long been regarded as an easy
way for corrupt foreign leaders and criminals to “clean” large amounts of stolen money in a single transaction.
The National Crime Agency believes that the issue is seriously pushing up the property prices across London. They suggest that the artificially inflated prices in central London are having a knock-on effect across the capital, pushing up prices and making many homes unaffordable for average earners.
James Turner at Turner Little supports the Prime Ministers efforts to clamp down on money laundering but believes that the vast majority of cases where offshore companies have been used are legitimate.
“Currently there are more than 100,000 UK property titles, worth over £122bn, registered to overseas companies, and a large percentage of those purchases have nothing to do with laundering or corruption. Whilst it is very important to eradicate foreign money laundering from the UK property market, innocent people who have used offshore companies should be entitled to their privacy” he said.
Turner Little
Turner Little was founded in 1998 and it has since become a well-established UK based professional Company Registration Agents, Registered Bank Intermediaries and Business Consultants, as well as Trust providers.
