The Law Society of England and Wales has welcomed the government’s new anti-money laundering and recovery strategy, but has warned about the potential for “increased burden” and duplication of work for solicitors and firms.
The Anti-money laundering and asset recovery strategy 2026 – 2029 sets out the government’s £550 million-backed core objectives for defending the UK against the criminal activity behind money laundering.
The government estimates that as much as £100 billion is laundered through and within UK companies annually. Conservative estimates suggest that between £6.1 billion to £8.9 billion may have been reinvested into further crime, with the money used to fund the next wave of offending. The majority, between £13.0 billion to £15.8 billion, may have been spent on broader consumption, including on assets such as real estate and luxury goods
The government’s three-pronged strategy aims to “make the UK’s defences more effective and efficient, while making it simpler and safer for honest businesses to grow,” while “dismantling high-harm criminal networks at home and abroad,” and “recovering more criminal assets, returning money to law enforcement, victims and the public”.
Law Society president, Mark Evans, said: “The government is right to focus anti-money laundering efforts on the highest-risk criminal activity and improving the effectiveness of the regime, rather than simply increasing compliance requirements.
“We urge the government to ensure reforms are supported with measurable outcomes that demonstrate how they help identify, disrupt and prevent crime, not by the volume of checks firms are required to undertake. Solicitors will expect to see a clear alignment between the strategy’s commitment to proportionate, risk-based regulation and the approach taken across the supervisory framework, which is currently being legislated for through the Financial Services and Markets Bill. The government must make sure that together these measures do not amount to duplication or increased burden of compliance obligation for solicitors and firms.
“We look forward to working with the government, regulators and industry partners to ensure any reforms help solicitors focus their resources on identifying and preventing genuine criminal activity.”
In their joint ministerial statement on the government’s new strategy, Dan Jarvis MP, security minister, and Lucy Rigby MP, economic secretary to the Treasury, said: “Money laundering is the lifeblood of crime, powering drug trafficking, people smuggling, fraud and corruption. It enables criminals, corrupt elites and hostile actors to move and exploit their illegal gains, compromising our national security, eroding trust in our institutions, undermining our prosperity and causing real harm to the public across the UK. This government will not tolerate it.”
One Response
The Government’s new AML Strategy aims to make the UK “simpler and safer for honest businesses to grow” while dismantling criminal networks. Laudable, but confused.
For two years, the Treasury and the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (Housing) have pulled in opposite directions. Treasury wants more AML and moves supervision from SRA to FCA. Housing wants quicker homebuying, 20-day exchanges, frictionless, shareable data.
The Government cannot will both ends and ignore the means. There is virtually no evidence of criminality by hard-pressed conveyancers. What is being eroded is the independence of the profession, information-sharing that collides with legal privilege, double jeopardy with two regulators, data providers who disclaim liability in law while conveyancers retain it in full.
You cannot have a faster market and a heavier AML regime without deciding who bears the risk and who holds the liability. Until Treasury and Housing are reconciled, we will have neither security nor speed, only hard-pressed lawyers carrying both.