The UK has accelerated its plans to tackle foreign money laundering in the country. On Tuesday, new legislation will be published in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the British interior ministry said in a statement on Monday.

With the new laws, foreign owners of British real estate should be better registered. The government is also given more powers to investigate the origin of the wealth of foreign home owners. The ministry also announced plans for a “fundamental reform” of Companies House, the government body that records company information and makes that information publicly accessible.

London, in particular, is a place where a lot of dubious international money, not infrequently originating from Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan is laundered due to lingering new legislation by successive governments in the country. The UK government body investigating organised crime estimates that money laundering costs the UK some 100 billion pounds a year. Which it isn’t – because this is inbound transactions.