PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
British Overseas Territories: Companies (20 November 2015)

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what assessment she has made of the potential benefits to developing countries of the implementation of public registers of beneficial ownership by UK Overseas Territories with financial centres.

Asked by:
Mike Kane (Labour)

The UK continues to lead the way on beneficial ownership disclosure and to encourage others to do the same. We are having discussions at both Ministerial and official level with the Overseas Territories to emphasise the importance of this agenda. Any system should meet the following criteria: UK and domestic law enforcement and tax authorities must be able to access company beneficial ownership information without restriction, subject to relevant safeguards; these competent authorities should be able to quickly identify all companies that a particular beneficial owner has a stake in, without needing to submit multiple and repeated requests; and companies or their beneficial owners must not be alerted to the fact that an investigation is under way.

Answered by:
Sir Desmond Swayne (Conservative)
26 November 2015