New Anti-Corruption Champion and NCA funding as campaign against corruption steps up

Baroness Margaret Hodge announced as UK’s new Anti-Corruption Champion as National Crime Agency receives new fund­ing and sanc­tions imposed on illic­it gold trade

• Baroness Hodge of Barking appoint­ed UK Anti-Corruption Champion after decades of cam­paign­ing against cor­rup­tion and illic­it finance. 
• Foreign Secretary announces new £36 mil­lion sup­port for National Crime Agency’s work to com­bat cor­rup­tion on vis­it with Baroness Hodge and the Security Minister today.
• Further sanc­tions also announced tar­get­ing the illic­it gold trade, which is fuelling cor­rup­tion and financ­ing Putin’s war efforts. 

Baroness Hodge of Barking will sup­port the government’s agen­da to tack­le cor­rup­tion at home and over­seas as the Prime Minister’s new UK Anti-Corruption Champion, the gov­ern­ment has announced today.

Baroness Hodge is a lead­ing cam­paign­er on cor­rup­tion and illic­it finance. As Chair of the Public Accounts Committee from 2010–2015 and of the APPG on Anti-Corruption and Responsible Tax, she has shone a light on the impact of dirty mon­ey in the UK. 

In her role as the new UK Anti-Corruption Champion, she will work with Parliament, the pri­vate sec­tor and civ­il soci­ety to help dri­ve deliv­ery of the government’s pri­or­i­ties to clamp down on cor­rup­tion and the organ­ised crim­i­nals who ben­e­fit from it, help­ing to deliv­er safer streets and secure borders. 

The Foreign Secretary, Security Minister and Baroness Hodge vis­it­ed the National Crime Agency (NCA) today to hear first-hand about their work tack­ling cor­rup­tion and dirty mon­ey in the UK and overseas. 

During the vis­it, the Foreign Secretary announced that FCDO will extend its fund­ing sup­port to the NCA’s International Corruption Unit (ICU) by up to £36 mil­lion over 5 years. This will help the ICU to con­tin­ue its suc­cess­ful inves­ti­ga­tions of cross-bor­der cor­rup­tion, mon­ey laun­der­ing and bribery cas­es over­seas. The ICU has already frozen over £441 mil­lion of assets relat­ed to inter­na­tion­al cor­rup­tion since 2020. 

Tackling cor­rup­tion is fun­da­men­tal to our nation­al secu­ri­ty, which is a foun­da­tion of this government’s Plan for Change to deliv­er growth, putting more mon­ey in people’s pock­ets, get­ting the NHS back on its feet, rebuild­ing Britain, and secur­ing our bor­ders in a decade of nation­al renewal. 

Foreign Secretary David Lammy said:

Corruption pos­es a real threat to the UK. It enables the activ­i­ties of dic­ta­tors, smug­glers and organ­ised crim­i­nals around the world, mak­ing our streets less safe and our bor­ders less secure.

Take Syria, where Bashar al-Assad was oust­ed from pow­er this week­end after decades of bru­tal sup­pres­sion, financed in recent years by laun­der­ing the pro­ceeds from the ille­gal Captagon trade abroad.

This gov­ern­ment will make the UK a hos­tile envi­ron­ment for the cor­rupt and their ill-got­ten gains as we put nation­al secu­ri­ty as a foun­da­tion of our Plan for Change and decade of nation­al renewal. 

That’s why I’m delight­ed to con­firm fur­ther fund­ing to the National Crime Agency’s International Corruption Unit and wel­come Baroness Hodge as the UK’s Anti-Corruption Champion to bear down on this menace.

Security Minister Dan Jarvis said:

We are proud to announce the appoint­ment of Baroness Hodge of Barking as the government’s new UK Anti-Corruption Champion.

Margaret brings decades of expe­ri­ence and exper­tise to this impor­tant role, and I know she is the right per­son to help dri­ve for­ward our ambi­tion to tack­le cor­rup­tion in all its forms — both at home and overseas.

We under­stand the scale of the chal­lenge and are ready to put in the hard work to deliv­er the cred­i­ble and last­ing change our coun­try needs. I look for­ward to hav­ing Margaret along­side us to sup­port that work.

Anti-Corruption Champion Baroness Hodge of Barking said:

After years of cam­paign­ing on the issue, I feel priv­i­leged and delight­ed to be able to work as the Government’s cham­pi­on, com­bat­ting cor­rup­tion and the illic­it finance that flows from it, both at home and abroad.

The time has now come to put an end to dither and delay. We must take deter­mined and effec­tive action and I look for­ward to play­ing my part in that work.

The UK has also imposed fur­ther sanc­tions to tack­le dirty mon­ey, this time tar­get­ing the illic­it gold trade. Illicit gold is an assault on the legit­i­mate trade of a valu­able com­mod­i­ty, fuelling cor­rup­tion, under­min­ing the rule of law, and entrench­ing human rights abus­es such as child labour. Russia uses the illic­it gold trade to laun­der mon­ey and evade sanc­tions, in doing so bol­ster­ing Putin’s war efforts. 

Today’s sanc­tions will dis­rupt and deter the illic­it gold trade by impos­ing asset freezes on five indi­vid­u­als, includ­ing infa­mous British-Kenyan gold smug­gler Kamlesh Pattni and his enablers. Pattni smug­gles illic­it gold out of south­ern Africa for use in mon­ey laun­der­ing and was impli­cat­ed in the Goldenberg cor­rup­tion scan­dal in the 1990s. 

The gov­ern­ment has also pledged to bring for­ward an ambi­tious, gov­ern­ment-wide anti-cor­rup­tion strat­e­gy in 2025, which will draw on exper­tise from across gov­ern­ment, law enforce­ment, pri­vate sec­tor, civ­il soci­ety, and acad­e­mia, to devel­op a sin­gle UK response to tack­ling cor­rup­tion, and ensure that this is reflect­ed in the UK’s diplo­mat­ic engage­ment around the world. 

These announce­ments come on the back of a major NCA inves­ti­ga­tion last week – Operation Destabilise – that exposed and dis­rupt­ed Russian mon­ey laun­der­ing net­works sup­port­ing seri­ous and organ­ised crime around the world, fur­ther high­light­ing the harm caused by dirty mon­ey to UK and inter­na­tion­al security. 

Background

About the ICU

The International Corruption Unit (ICU) inves­ti­gates inter­na­tion­al bribery, cor­rup­tion and relat­ed mon­ey-laun­der­ing offences. Its key role is to investigate:

• mon­ey laun­der­ing in the UK result­ing from cor­rup­tion of high-rank­ing offi­cials overseas.
• bribery involv­ing UK–based com­pa­nies or nation­als which has an inter­na­tion­al element.
• cross-bor­der bribery where there is a link to the UK.

The ICU also traces and recov­ers the pro­ceeds of inter­na­tion­al corruption.

Today’s sanc­tions con­sist of three indi­vid­u­als des­ig­nat­ed under the UK’s Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions Regulations 2021:

• Kamlesh Pattni, a British-Kenyan busi­ness­man who has used bribery to export gold from south­ern Africa as a means of laun­der­ing dirty money.
• Also des­ig­nat­ed are Pattni’s wife and broth­er-in-law, who have a long his­to­ry of involve­ment in his net­work of companies.

A fur­ther indi­vid­ual is des­ig­nat­ed under the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019:

• Alain Goetz, a Belgian gold trad­er at the head of var­i­ous gold refiner­ies and com­pa­nies across Africa. Goetz has smug­gled illic­it gold extract­ed from mines in the DRC con­trolled by armed groups which have been involved in seri­ous human rights violations.

A fur­ther indi­vid­ual is des­ig­nat­ed under the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019:

• Anto Joseph, the CEO and man­ag­er of sev­er­al gold trad­ing com­pa­nies, includ­ing Paloma Precious (des­ig­nat­ed by the UK in November 2023). Paloma Precious has pur­chased more than USD 300 mil­lion of Russian gold, there­by indi­rect­ly pro­vid­ing rev­enue for the Government of Russia which could be used for the war in Ukraine.

Definitions:  

• Asset freeze: an asset freeze pre­vents any UK cit­i­zen, or any busi­ness in the UK, from deal­ing with any funds or eco­nom­ic resources which are owned, held or con­trolled by the des­ig­nat­ed per­son. It also pre­vents funds or eco­nom­ic resources being pro­vid­ed to or for the ben­e­fit of the des­ig­nat­ed per­son. UK finan­cial sanc­tions apply to all per­sons with­in the ter­ri­to­ry and ter­ri­to­r­i­al sea of the UK and to all UK per­sons, wher­ev­er they are in the world.
• Travel ban: a trav­el ban means that the des­ig­nat­ed per­son must be refused leave to enter or to remain in the United Kingdom, pro­vid­ing the indi­vid­ual is an exclud­ed per­son under sec­tion 8B of the Immigration Act 1971.
• Trust ser­vices sanc­tions pro­hib­it the pro­vi­sion of trust ser­vices to or for the ben­e­fit of a des­ig­nat­ed per­son, includ­ing the cre­ation, oper­a­tion or man­age­ment of a trust or sim­i­lar arrange­ment, with­in the UK or by UK per­sons out­side the UK.

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Press release FCDO
Published 9 December 2024