I recall the major role that the hon. Gentleman played in trying to obtain commitments in relation to the north-west and, in particular, his constituency. The same issue will arise in other cases. He is right. Although commitments were made, there is an issue of enforceability. That is what we now wish to address by strengthening the rules.
Let me move on to company transparency. The OECD has reported that
“almost every economic crime involves the misuse of corporate vehicles”.
There are staggering sums of money involved. Organised crime costs the UK alone about £24 billion a year. The European Commission estimates that global criminal proceeds are in the order of $2 trillion. Of course, not all crime flows through companies, but much does. More specifically, in 2011 the World Bank carried out an exercise that suggested that 70% of grand corruption cases involved at least one corporate vehicle to hide beneficial ownership and the true source of funds. Very often, criminals create complex corporate structures spanning multiple jurisdictions to hide the involvement of a company. That is why the UK pushed the agenda for greater corporate transparency during our G8 presidency last year. We obtained agreement from G8 members that all would take action to increase corporate transparency. That is what we are now doing, thus demonstrating our commitment.
We wish to help to deter, identify and sanction those who hide their interest in UK companies to facilitate illegal activities, as well as generally creating a more trusted business environment. That is why we are going to require companies to keep a register of the people who have significant control over that company—their beneficial owners—and provide this information to Companies House, where it will be publicly available. We will lead the way within the developed economies in having an open register. Alongside that, the Bill abolishes the use of bearer shares, which can change hands without any record and have been open to abuse for tax evasion and money laundering purposes.