I welcome the fact that HMRC is already carrying out an
intensive investigation of offshore companies, including in Panama, and has
asked the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists to share the
leaked data. They will act on it swiftly and appropriately. In addition to this
I welcome the Prime Minister’s
announcement that a new taskforce
will be established to deal with the
so-called Panama Papers.
The Prime Minister has committed to provide resources to ensure
that the files are fully investigated, once shared with HMRC, including initial
new funding of up to £10 million to support the taskforce’s work. I agree that
there is more that can be done to tackle tax avoidance, evasion and other
exploitations of the tax system. I am glad the Chancellor is working with other
major countries to speed up progress towards sharing beneficial ownership
information, so that enforcement agencies can share information on who really
owns companies. This would allow for more effective investigation of financial
wrongdoing.
The UK will publish its own register of company beneficial
ownership from June 2016, making it clear who the real owners of companies are,
the first major country to have such a list in place; the information it
contains will be free for anyone to access.
