No quicker than we’d finished saying ‘HIP-HIP hooray’ to the delayed introduction of the Home Information Pack, we had some more good news on another change of heart by the Government, this time on the money laundering regulations.
A few months ago, the Treasury was insistent that its hands were tied; the definition of ‘beneficial ownership’ in the regulations had to be the same as the one in the European directive and any problems on how to interpret that was a matter for professional bodies to give guidance on. This was not a position the Law Society could begin to accept on behalf of our members or the regulated sector as a whole. Guidance has no proper legal status to protect us against committing a crime!
