Cleaning up dodgy property ventures
LONDON leaders want to know how they can dob in luxury property owners they suspect are bankrolling their mansions with dirty money.
Westminster City Councillor Ian Rowley said the wealthy borough’s billionaires’ rows made it a sitting duck for money from “various ghastly regimes laundered through gold taps and gold toilets”
He said: “When we put up some vulgar, plutocratic block of flats in the city it’s clearly not for locals – are we asking who it’s coming from?”
Politicians are under pressure to crack down on dirty money flowing through the capital, and to prevent oligarchs from turning luxury property into empty “ghost homes” that have come under increased scrutiny amid the affordable housing crisis.
Westminster’s audit and performance committee chairman and fellow councillors questioned council staff on Wednesday November 14 on how they could securely tip off antiterror and anti-money laundering agencies. They said they were often suspicious about who was behind developments on their patch.
Council staff told them it was a valid question that they did not yet have a clear answer to – as the source of funds were not up for consideration during the planning process.
Cllr Paul Swaddle added that councillors were having to make decisions when they did not know how a development was funded, noting anyone could employ a consultant or have a conduit make applications on their behalf.
“What if we just know,? asked Cllr Rowley.
Council staff told the councillors in response to their concerns they would ask the National Crime Agency for advice on how councillors and staff could share their suspicions.
Their debate came in the same week Westminster declared it will no longer be rolling out a red carpet to supermansions and skyscrapers. The council’s planning chief Cllr Richard Beddoe has said he wants “a restriction on oligarch homes” amid the council’s push for more affordable housingr.
“I think our new policy on size of homes is a good start,” Cllr Swaddle said of the announcement on Wednesday.
In 2015, the NCA warned London’s property market was being used by foreign criminals to launder billions, after seeing a spike in transactions from corporations based in overseas tax havens.
MPs from the foreign affairs select committee earlier this year warned the Government in a report on Russian corruption that kleptocrats and human rights abusers had been able to exploit the UK too easily. They hid and laundered money through City institutions, holding “clear implications for our national security”, it said.
Transparency International UK had at one stage identified 176 properties worth £4.4 billion in the UK bought with “suspicious wealth” – with more than a fifth owned by Russian individuals, the report added.
The Government unveiled draft legislation in July to force overseas property owners to reveal their names to a new database. It would introduce a ban on buying or selling property without revealing the true beneficial owner, and threaten jailtime for those who tried to give false information.
The Westminster councillors’ debate came about as they zeroed in on the aspect of its latest anti-bribery policy which said cash payments of £10,000 or more would not be accepted.
Cllr Rowley was assured council staff would refer risky cash payment attempts of that magnitude to Government agencies, after asking:
“If he’s paying his business rates from cash in a suitcase we’re asking some questions, right?”
When we put up some vulgar, plutocratic block of flats in the city it’s clearly not for locals.