In our first Economic Crime Manifesto, we recommended that the Government increase the price of company incorporation from £12 to £50 to ensure that Companies House has a sustainable self-funding model for the future while keeping the cost globally competitive. £12 registration fees in the UK were dwarfed by most other nations, and stood well below the EU average of €300. UK companies have for too long been the vehicle of choice for hiding, moving and laundering dirty money, and this was only made easier by ludicrously low company fees. Baroness Hodge tabled amendments to increase the cost of incorporation at Committee Stage, that were rejected by the Government on the grounds that it would stifle British entrepreneurship. In response, APPG mobilised a cross-party coalition of MPs to make the argument that increasing incorporation fees would not stifle economic growth, rather it would disincentivise the creation of shell companies, and crucially, the increase in revenue would enable Companies House to fulfil conduct gold standard identity verification and proactively prevent economic crime. After much resistance from the Government during Committee and Report Stage in the Commons, and in the face of an amendment that had garnered cross-party support from over 25 MPs, the Government committed to increasing the fees to £50.

At the Lords stage of the Economic Crime Bill, the APPG achieved a breakthrough on corporate criminal liability. After multiple amendments by APPG champions introducing new “failure to prevent” offences for economic crime, including money laundering and fraud, the Government created a "failure to prevent" fraud offence for companies. This new offence is a remarkable step forward in the fight against economic crime. Up to now, whilst there have been some regulatory fines, these are not sufficient to drive real behavioural change, as they have simply become a cost of doing business. Although the Government offence excludes money laundering and includes a carve out for SMEs, which means that the offence will only apply to large companies, this new criminal offence will create a powerful deterrent to fraudulent behaviour. At the same time, and also in response our amendments, the Government introduced long-awaited reform to the identification doctrine, the Victorian principle which underpinned our corporate criminal liability framework and made it virtually impossible to hold large companies to account. Together, these amendments constitute the biggest breakthrough in UK corporate criminal liability reform in over 100 years, and were achieved through strong cross-party mobilisation by the APPG in the face of entrenched opposition from the Government.