British property held at more than £ 100 billion | News from the United Kingdom

A new badysis suggests that more than £ 100 billion of real estate in England and Wales is being held secretly. More than 87,000 properties are owned by public companies registered in tax havens, according to research by the Global Witness Transparency Group.

The badysis reveals that 40% of properties are in London. Cadogan Square in Knightsbridge, where the average property costs £ 3m, houses at least 134 secretly owned properties. Buckingham Palace Road is also home to a large number, with an estimated combined value of £ 350 million.

The revelation comes as the joint joint committee of Parliament on the draft law on registration of foreign entities meets Monday to hear testimony on the impact of the ownership of public limited companies.

The government is committed to setting up a registry of British homeowners at its 2016 anti-corruption summit, but since then progress has been slow.

"It is becoming increasingly clear that British property is one of the favorite tools of criminals and corrupt criminals for stealing and money laundering," said Ava Lee, head of Global Anti-Corruption Campaign. Witness.

"This badysis reveals the alarming magnitude of the UK real estate scandal".

The combined value of the properties amounted to at least £ 56 billion, according to historical land register data at the time of acquisition. Once inflation is taken into account, it would exceed £ 100 billion.

Some 10,000 properties are located in Westminster, while nearly 6,000 are located in Kensington and Chelsea. Camden is home to more than 2,300 unnamed properties, and nearly 2,000 are located in Tower Hamlets.

According to Global Witness, his investigations have shown how criminals and corrupt politicians use the UK real estate market to hide or clean dirty money and to provide a safe haven for themselves and their families.

In 2015, he revealed how the mysterious owner of a £ 147 million sterling London real estate empire, owned via a network of offshore companies, could be linked to a former chief of the Kazakh secret police accused of murder, torture and money laundering.