Chief Minister Allan Bell MHK has confirmed that the business community will be consulted in the ongoing review of the Island’s beneficial ownership regime which the Government has committed to undertake as part of its G8 Action Plan.
 
The Action Plan, published in June last year at the time of the G8 Summit in Northern Ireland, includes a commitment to review existing provisions for the identification of the beneficial ownership of companies to consider whether the introduction of a centralised registry holding this information would improve transparency.
 
Last week the United Kingdom Government published the outcome of its consultation on corporate transparency issues and confirmed details of its proposal for a publicly accessible central registry of beneficial ownership information.
 
The Chief Minister said: ‘The Isle of Man has a robust regime in place to ensure the identification of the beneficial ownership of companies and the availability of this information to the authorities. We have already made an international commitment to review the regime, and now that the UK Government has clarified its proposed way forward on beneficial ownership, it is logical to include that model as one of the options in our review.’
 
Mr Bell added: ‘The outcome of the exercise has to be appropriate for the Isle of Man, of course, which is why we will be engaging in full consultation with the business community before reaching any conclusions.’