PM vows action on London offshore property boom

Tuesday 28 July 2015

David Cameron is pledging to crack down on offshore companies buying up London properties in a major speech in Singapore.

In the speech, the UK Prime Minister will go further than he has gone before in promising to introduce a central land registry in the UK and signalling a consultation on a full register of “beneficial ownership” of properties setting out exactly who really owns what.

While Jersey is internationally recognised for the strength of its financial services regulation, an investigation by Transparency International found that 36,342 London properties are owned by offshore companies – 16% of those companies are in Jersey.

Most of those companies are legitimate investments by people seeking to take advantage of the incredible property boom in the last few years - but a significant number of purchases have been investigated by police over corruption, and money laundering attempts.

The speech, which has been widely briefed to the media in advance, includes a promise that “the UK must not become a safe haven for corrupt money from around the world”.

It comes during Mr Cameron’s four-day tour of south-east Asia.

In it, Mr Cameron will say: “I want Britain to be the most open country in the world for investment. But I want to ensure that all this money is clean money.

“There is no place for dirty money in Britain. Indeed, there should be no place for dirty money anywhere.

“Together, I believe we can defeat the cancer of corruption in all its forms and, with it, strike the biggest blow for our generation in the struggle to ensure greater prosperity in every part of the world.”