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David Cameron has challenged Jersey and other offshore finance centres to set up central registries on company ownership to help tackle tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance.
In a public letter to the Chief Ministers of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man, the UK Prime Minister has declared his intention to set up a publicly-accessible central registry – and has warned finance centres that “the world is watching”.
He says that legislation will be coming to the UK Parliament soon, but said that the UK register would stop short of publishing all of the information held. He says that any information that could help identity theft and fraud would not be published, but would be accessible only to law enforcement and tax authorities.
The letter is a challenge to finance centres to back-up talk about transparency with concrete action. The Chief Minister's department responded to the letter saying that they planned to study it carefully in the light of the responses to their ongoing consultation on a register, which is due to finish at the end of April.
Mr Cameron wrote: “I am firmly of the view that making company beneficial ownership information open to the public is by far the best approach.
“It will give businesses and individuals a clearer picture of who ultimately owns and controls the companies they are dealing with and make it easier for banks, lawyers and others to conduct due diligence on their customers.
“It will shed light on those who have provided false information, helping to tackle crime where it occurs and deterring people from providing this false information in the first place. And it will help reduce the cost of investigations for tax and law enforcement authorities here and overseas, particularly in developing countries, by making information more easily available to them at the very start of an investigation.
“The rest of the world is watching us closely and a public registry will demonstrate the sincerity of our commitment to improve corporate behaviour and set a new standard for transparency of company ownership. I hope you will also consult on a public registry and look closely at what we are doing in the UK.”
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