Dark money: London’s dirty secret | Hacker News Reader

Dark money: London’s dirty secret

ft.com

85 pointscallumlocke18 comments

To me, the City itself is London's dirty little secret. The City is not like the rest of London, in terms of political governance. It is a very old enclave, governed by the City of London Corporation.

The City is an ancient creation, centered on the old Roman city. It has a government that far precedes that of modern Britain. It has its own constitution, council, and chief executive (mayor).

Over many centuries, the power of the City has been tested many times. Even the Magna Carta specifically excludes reforms to the City in stating "the City of London shall have/enjoy its ancient liberties."

In addition to self-government, those "ancient liberties" include a certain amount of regulatory independence, especially in the financial sector. The City embraces finance, with the government having an explicit mission to promote it.

As a result, the City is an endlessly useful haven for all sorts of companies and individuals to escape financial scrutiny, right in the heart of modern day Britain.

The City gets exactly the same amount of scrutiny by financial supervisors, FCA etc as the rest of the nation. The city is special in a political sense in that the resident companies rather than resident citizens are the majority of the voters and steer the borough-level politics - but like any other county council, the CoLC doesn't set regulation, determine taxation, supervise banks or anything of that sort. That is all done by parliament, and applies for the City same as for the rest of the country.

Albeit with some interesting side-channels.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_remembrancer

Parliament doesn't enforce regulation either. That's the job of the Financial Conduct Authority.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_Conduct_Authority

...Which might be considered to be operating with quite a light touch, just as its FSA predecessor did.

In modern times, the City has also used a cluster of other special legal constructs in and around Britain as cut-outs.

The City maintains close ties with both the Crown dependency of Jersey, and the British Virgin Islands, which are well-known places to conduct business off the books.

Am I right in thinking thought, that the bulk of UK financial policing is done by the City police, who are responsible to the cooperation, the same way the Met police are responsible to the London Mayor?

Police tend to police in the interests of the guy who signs their cheques.

If anyone cares to know more about the City of London, CGP Grey did a nice two-parter video describing its history, its privileges and how to become mayor if you care to.

The (Secret) City of London, Part 1: History https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrObZ_HZZUc

The (Secret) City of London, Part 2: Government https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ROpIKZe-c

    > the City is an endlessly
    > useful haven for all sorts
    > of companies and individuals
    > to escape financial scrutiny

Can you cite a single meaningful difference in the financial regulations a company in The City vs one in Southwark faces?

I thought this was common knowledge. Private Eye had a good write up on some similarly egregious practices a couple of years back: https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/08/09/london-is-t...

I wonder how long until the banking industry gets the disrupt it so desperately needs.

Never? Minus some actual pleb revolution, banks all but run federal governments through rotating door hires and friends in high places. Banks paying millions in fines have billions in cash and assets and trillions in managed assets.

As long as money rules the earth, there will be no tech lead "disruption" of any kind.

Besides, their tech is incredibly advanced.

The UK is not federated. England, the subject of this article, is even less of a "federal" government than the UK.

If we're gonna start talking about power structures, it's important to get the power structures right. The majority of important world states are not federal.

Central government then. Semantics doesn't change the point, but I'm sure you realize that.

You can't say that government is controlled by rich people, and then say the fundamental nature of that government is "semantics".

You're proposing a theory of government; it is your job to get right the basic facts.

Their tech is not incredibly advanced. Their tech is is shower of shit that lurches from one disaster to another. Source: have worked in a few investment banks.

How are you going to disrupt it? Offering cheaper prices for tax-dodging? The essence of startup disruption is to offer customers better value, and in this case the customers are tax-dodgers and mafioso.

Embargoing the countries where personal financials aren't required to be public on the Internet might work, but who's going to embargo the US? It's ridiculous.

Not really a secret, as I have done in a number of threads on the subject, I would recommend checking out the book "Treasure Islands" by Nicholas Shaxson. It basically shows how the UK is involved in international tax affairs.

If you are interested in learning more I humbly suggest watching the documentary "The UK Gold". The trailer can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXBJLH2xrBM

I'm in no way affiliated with the documentary but I do work in the Square Mile. I always had a hint of these things but never really had to time to research it for myself and this documentary helped me to understand it and fill in the gaps.

I figured it would be about the child sex trafficking done by the rich and powerful, no it's just about tax evasion.

Well, I am sure there is some overlap between the two, but I know you meant the focus of the article.

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