UK government widens beneficial ownership transparency policy commitments

The government published a plan of how it will be implementing its G20 commitment to beneficial ownership transparency earlier this week.

One policy which is already far advanced is the UK register of beneficial ownership (to be known as the people with significant control register) which will apply to all UK companies and LLPs from April 2016, with the information becoming public from June 2016. For more information about the people with significant control register, see our hub here.

The government plan also lists several other commitments to be implemented in 2017 through new UK Money Laundering Regulations which will be enacted to implement the 4th Money Laundering Directive.

Commitments include:

• A consultation on extending beneficial ownership transparency to foreign companies investing in high value property or bidding on UK public contracts.
• Creating an obligation to hold in a central register the beneficial ownership information of trusts that generate tax consequences in the UK. Domestic competent authorities will be able to access this information.
• Ensuring trustees of express trusts obtain and hold adequate, accurate and current beneficial ownership information for their trusts, including the settlor(s), trustee(s) and beneficiaries. Mechanisms will be put in place to ensure that domestic competent authorities have access to this information.
• Ensuring that financial institutions and designated non-financial businesses and professions undertaking customer due diligence are able to access information held on the central register of company beneficial ownership information. Trustees of express trusts will disclose their status, and provide beneficial ownership information of their trusts, when acting in their capacity as a trustee.

Osborne Clarke Comment

These policy commitments have potentially far reaching consequences, impacting trust, tax, banking and real estate arrangements. The UK is already at the forefront of beneficial ownership transparency by being the first major jurisdiction to be implementing a public beneficial ownership register. These commitments will take the UK even further down the road to greater transparency.