Premier Juliana O’Connor-Connolly met with UK Minister David Rutley in London as pressure mounts for Britain to have its overseas territories implement a public beneficial ownership registry.
Though there has been no official word from the Premier’s Office on her UK visit, a post from Governor Jane Owen’s official Facebook page on Monday afternoon confirmed the meeting between O’Connor-Connolly and Rutley.
The governor’s post gave no specific information, but came with the caption, “Great pleasure to join Honourable Premier at her meeting with Minister Rutley this afternoon. An opportunity to discuss our vibrant partnership and mutual support and action”.
In November, Cayman legislators passed the Beneficial Ownership Transparency Bill 2023, which will allow access to beneficial ownership information as part of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing investigations. It does not, however, open access to the public.
While presenting the bill, Deputy Premier André Ebanks, minister of financial services and commerce, said the legislation consolidates and enhances the beneficial ownership legislative framework into a single act.
“This will streamline processes and procedures to ease the administrative burden on government agencies and industry participants,” he said.
The Cayman Islands, he added, has been collecting beneficial ownership information – details on who ultimately owns or controls an asset or entity – for over two decades.
Questions continue
Rutley, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, faced questioning on Thursday from Labour MP Margaret Hodge in Parliament on the beneficial ownership issue.
Hodge had questioned whether his department planned to set a timetable for the introduction of public registers of beneficial ownership in the Overseas Territories.
In response, Rutley said that in December he laid a written statement that outlined Overseas Territories’ commitments and timelines to implement public registers. This includes either public registers accessible to all members of the public or public registers with access predicated on ‘legitimate interest’.
“We are providing technical and financial assistance to expedite implementation in 2024 of these public registers,” he said. “Where public access is predicated on ‘legitimate interest’, I have clearly stated to OT Governments the UK’s expectation that this will be expansive, including media and civil society, among others, and an interim step to providing access to all members of the public in due course.”
Earlier this month, the UK Guardian reported that, Britain’s deputy foreign secretary, Andrew Mitchell, said “crown dependencies and overseas territories will face fresh demands from the Foreign Office to comply with UK laws setting up public registers of beneficial share ownership”.
The article said Mitchell suggested nearly 40% of the ‘dirty’ money in the world is going through the City of London, overseas territories and crown dependencies.
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We already have one of the toughest regimes in the world for the formation of corporations. Far tougher than the UK where one can buy a company “off the shelf” with no questions asked.
And London is the money laundering capital of the world.
The UK should get their own house in order before leaning on us.