UK government launches new strategy against 'professional enablers' of criminal proceeds.

It was reported on Monday, 08 December 2025, that the UK government has announced a new strategy targeting 'corrupt lawyers, accountants and bankers who help dirty money flow'.

• https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6932caa7375aee4a15ee8c8c/36.37_HO_JACU-Strategy_v12b_FINAL_WEB.pdf

The strategy will expand the use of sanctions and scale up police activity to prosecute 'professional enablers' in the UK and overseas for moving criminal proceeds.

According to the strategy document,

• The National Crime Agency (NCA) has received over 347 requests for assistance on grand corruption investigations and, as a result, has identified over GBP1.8 billion of hidden stolen assets.
• This has directly supported the freezing of GBP641 million between July 2017 and December 2024.
• The NCA estimates that over GBP100 billion could be laundered through the UK every year.

The new strategy

• Builds on that to make sure 'corrupt actors, including kleptocrats, are disrupted from exploiting UK society and its institutions'. There will also be international measures to tackle the harm corruption causes to the UK and UK interests overseas.
• Reveals that the UK will publish a new anti-money laundering (AML) and asset recovery strategy in 2026. In the meantime, the government has committed to immediate actions to tackle the laundering of corrupt funds.

The strategy says

• 'To ensure that corrupt actors are unable to easily obscure, move and benefit from illicit funds in the UK and overseas, we will focus on transparency of ownership, international asset recovery, and professional enablers, '   
• One part of this is to work with the British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies to introduce and improve registers of beneficial ownership, and to improve access for UK law enforcement agencies and other UK authorities to beneficial ownership information on overseas entities.

According to the strategy document:-

• Some firms in the legal profession can represent clients who are beneficiaries of kleptocracy while remaining technically compliant with current legal frameworks.

Over the next five years, the UK will fund a dedicated ‘professional enablers’ co-ordinator to

• Improve the operational response to professional enablers.
• Consult on adding new regulated activities to the AML regulations throughout the strategy's lifetime.
• Enhance the government's understanding of the threat posed by international professional enablers in fuelling corruption and illicit finance.

Whistleblowing

• The government intends to improve the identification and reporting of enabling activity.
• Financial incentives will be offered to whistleblowers who report corruption and other economic crimes.

Anti-corruption in the UK will fall under the purview of

• The new 'anti-corruption champion', Margaret Hodge, formerly an MP and now a member of the House of Lords.
• The City of London Police's Domestic Corruption Unit (DCU) will be expanded by an additional GBP15 million to fund specialist officers to detect and disrupt bribery and money-laundering networks nationwide.

One of Hodge's first projects

• Will lead a government review of broader asset ownership and beneficial ownership in the UK to identify vulnerabilities that criminals could exploit and make recommendations to address them.
• Measures to address foreign criminality are also being introduced, including an expansion of the government's exclusion guidance announced earlier in 2025. This will give the Home Office powers to block 'elites with links to Putin’s regime' from entering the UK.

Sources

• https://www.step.org/industry-news/uk-government-launches-new-strategy-against-professional-enablers?utm_source=news+digest&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=UK+Industry+News+Digest+81225
• UK government
• https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rogue-insiders-and-dirty-money-targeted-in-corruption-crackdown
• UK government (strategy)
• https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-anti-corruption-strategy-2025
• https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6932caa7375aee4a15ee8c8c/36.37_HO_JACU-Strategy_v12b_FINAL_WEB.pdf