Kensington Community Event on Dirty Money and Fair Tax

On Monday 8th August, over 60 local residents gathered at The Elgin on Ladbroke Grove for a community event on dirty money and fair tax in the Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, co-hosted by the Kensington Against Dirty Money campaign and the Fair Tax Foundation.

Mary Patel from the Fair Tax Foundation presented ideas for local procurement reform and encouraged residents to push their K&C Councillors to join the Councils for Fair Tax Declaration.

Jonathan Benton from Intelligent Sanctuary discussed what data is needed to tackle money laundering, and the need for far more effective enforcement measures to investigate financial crime, including in our borough.

Monica Press, Chair of the Colville Forum, called for more community engagement on these types of issues where resident voices are too often ignored.

You can also read the full opening speech from Joe Powell, co-founder of Kensington Against Dirty Money:

It’s been almost five months since we launched the Kensington Against Dirty Money campaign.

From day 1 it’s been an extraordinary collective effort by many people in this room - from our launch event with our washing machine stuffed full of cash outside a kleptocat’s home in Holland Park, to meeting our MP, lobbying the Council, collecting nearly 1500 signatures, media interviews and much more. 

This has been a genuinely grassroots effort to take on corrupt wealth and create a fairer and more equal borough - and we have a lot to do. 

Problem

It’s worth reminding ourselves of the challenge we face and why we’re all here.

Kensington is at the epicentre of Britain’s dirty money problem.

There are over 6000 properties registered to foreign owners in Kensington and Chelsea, mostly to anonymous shell companies registered in tax havens. 

A quarter are based in Jersey and the British Virgin Islands - and I can guarantee it is not citizens of Jersey or the BVI that own these properties. 

Research from Transparency International has shown that there is at least £1.5billion worth of UK property owned by Russians accused of corruption or with links to the Kremlin – and nearly a fifth of this is in Kensington and Chelsea. 

Many of these houses stand empty of course - part of the 1 in 9 homes in our borough that are either long-term empty or second homes - while over 3000 families are waiting for a council house, 13% of households are overcrowded and the temporary accommodation level is 50% higher than the London average. 

The reality is for too long, we have allowed luxury properties in Britain to be bought up by autocrats, oligarchs and their families - who are looting their own countries and stashing that wealth here. 

Let me give you one example. The President of Azerbaijan has an official government salary of £175k a year. Yet thanks to leaks and investigative journalists we know his family have a £600 million UK property empire, including two townhouses and a flat by Holland Park worth £40M. 

In Azerbaijan, you would be intimidated, arrested or even worse for repeating this fact in public. 

Britain’s relaxed attitude to corrupt money has undermined those pushing for democracy in places like Azerbaijan, but it has also undermined democracy here - and it damages our own local communities. 

That is why we founded Kensington Against Dirty Money - because we know dirty money drives obscene levels of inequality in our borough, where we have 4 out 10 of the most expensive streets in England, while 1 in 4 kids grow up in poverty.

Successes

Now while the odds are stacked against us, there are steps we can take as a community to make a difference - and our campaign is already showing that when we’re organised and speak with a collective voice we do have power - as so many other brilliant activists through history have shown on a range of issues in North Kensington. 

Working with other major campaign groups we forced the government into action with the Economic Crime Act, which legislates for the first public register of the true owners of foreign-owned property in Britain. 

This means from January 2023 we should have access to who exactly owns the 6k+ properties in our borough that are registered overseas. 

We’ve also raised the profile of the dirty money problem in our borough with media coverage from the Independent, Financial Times, City AM to the New York Times, Le Monde and many others around the world. 

I’ve taken countless journalists on walking tours of our most famous properties purchased with corrupt money - several of which sent out heavies to stop us filming, including Mr Abramovich’s thugs on Kensington Palace Gardens! 

And we’ve also already inspired other anti-dirty money efforts in London - including the establishment of a new group in Tower Hamlets - and we’re hoping there will be a major announcement from Westminster Council next month.

What’s next

But there is a lot more we have to do - which I know the other two speakers will cover in detail. Our campaign must continue pushing hard for real action from our representatives.

First, we need to pass additional economic crime legislation to give Companies House the power to actually verify whether information provided on property ownership is accurate. This is supposed to come forward in Autumn - and we cannot let Prime Minister Truss or Sunak renege on it as they compete to out-Thatcher each other in a race to the bottom on financial regulation. 

Second, we need to fund law enforcement properly to go after corrupt money and put people behind bars. 

Third, we need to push our Council for action on empty homes, and to get their own house in order in terms of where our taxes are being spent. 

And finally, we need a culture change in this city. Too many of our professional services - from banks, to accountants, PR firms, art dealers and estate agents - have turned a blind eye to where the money is coming from as long as it’s profitable. This has to change. 

In 2010 one of the final acts of the Gordon Brown government was to pass the Bribery Act. That led to a huge shift in norms for British companies operating overseas - who used to routinely pay bribes for contracts. I think we need a similar shift so that companies can be held criminally liable for economic crimes including fraud, money laundering and false accounting.

Conclusion

I firmly believe we can make a difference - but for all these changes to happen we need public pressure.

We know that it took the invasion of Ukraine to actually get some movement on this agenda - but with crisis after crisis hitting our country at the moment, and the abysmal state of political leadership, we know that attention will shift. 

That’s why we must hold our politicians to account for what they’ve promised - and to do that we’ll need everyone in this room.

Let’s continue to stand up against dirty money in our community - and to fight for a fairer, more equal Kensington. 

Thank you.