Bribery, fraud, anti-money laundering | UK Regulatory Outlook June 2024

General election 2024: bribery, fraud, anti-money laundering aspects

As the UK approaches its general election, the two main contenders to form the next government, the Conservative and Labour parties have unveiled their manifestos.

The Conservative Party manifesto states that it intends to strengthen its work on combatting money laundering and illicit financial flows. It also plans to ensure that all British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies adopt open registers of beneficial ownership.

If elected, the Labour Party pledges to work in collaboration with the UK's allies and international financial centres in tackling corruption and money laundering in Britain, the British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.

While the Conservative manifesto did not detail specific fraud proposals, Labour has committed to introducing a new expanded fraud strategy that will aim to tackle a wider range of threats, including online, public sector and serious fraud. In particular, it plans to work with technology companies to prevent vulnerabilities on their platforms from being exploited by criminals.

Failure to prevent fraud offence

Although the government had said that it hoped to publish the guidance relating to failure to prevent fraud offences, as required under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 (ECCTA), in early summer 2024, we now understand that the guidance is not likely to be published until after parliament resumes, following the general election.

We also believe that the implementation period may now be extended to eight or nine months to allow time for businesses that will be subject to the offence (large organisations) to consider the guidance and implement necessary policies and procedures. While the exact timing is still to be confirmed, we currently anticipate that the offence will take effect towards the middle of 2025.

The offence, and the senior managers regime also contained in the ECCTA (find out more in our video), is highlighted in the Serious Fraud Office's 5 Year Strategy, launched in April 2024. This also refers to incentivising whistleblowers, enhanced cooperation with other enforcement agencies, greater use of technology and a greater focus on domestic fraud.