New report finds use of aid to tackle dirty money is crucial – but falls far short of what’s needed

The UK’s unique use of its aid budget to fund law enforcement efforts to combat international corruption falls far short of what’s needed despite delivering “welcome and valuable enforcement outcomes,” according to a new report launched today by Spotlight on Corruption.

With capacity to investigate as little as 20 cases at any one time, the National Crime Agency’s aid-funded International Corruption Unit (ICU), is struggling under the weight of its workload. 

Our report – “Global Corruption Busters: How development aid can boost the UK’s fight against dirty money” – looks at why the ICU’s work is so important in combatting corruption afflicting developing countries and the role the UK plays in enabling it. But the report also finds glaring enforcement gaps – no professional enabler of dirty money has yet been convicted under the programme, and no medium-sized companies have been convicted since the ICU took on the role of enforcement.

Our report further finds that the ICU is hobbled by real challenges in the wider enforcement and criminal justice landscape – including issues with retention of expertise, and extraordinarily long delays owing to disclosure requirements and the inequality of arms with wealthy suspects. 

We also note that much greater transparency of the unit’s work is needed – particularly on the enforcement outcomes that it achieves – to improve accountability and the deterrence effect of its work.

The report makes eight key recommendations to ensure a successful future for the UK’s aid-funded enforcement programme. The top two recommendations are that the FCDO should: 

1. commit to long-term sustainable funding, including a new round of multi-year funding beyond 2025 to allow for continued expansion of aid-funded enforcement and support investment in longer term capabilities; and 
2. ensure that aid-funded enforcement prioritises action against UK professional enablers that facilitate the laundering and hiding of corrupt money from developing countries.

Justin Moore, a Spotlight on Corruption Associate and the author of the report, said: 

“Since 2006 the UK has provided aid funding for law enforcement resources dedicated to investigating cases affecting developing countries – it is the only donor in the world to use aid money in this way. Overall, we found that the International Corruption Unit, working with the Crown Prosecution Service, has delivered extremely welcome and valuable enforcement outcomes in recent years. However, current enforcement capabilities fall far short of what is needed to deal with the UK’s role in developing country corruption.”

Dr Susan Hawley, Executive Director of Spotlight on Corruption, said: 

“Aid-funded enforcement is critical to maintaining the UK’s international reputation as a country that is serious about tackling corruption and recognises its role in exacerbating corruption in developing countries. But if the UK is really going to play a leadership role in tackling dirty money, we need a step change in the aid-funded programme, with more resources, more focus on enablers and more transparency.” 

This is the second in a series of reports by Spotlight looking at the current state of the UK’s enforcement of economic crime offences. The first in the series – All Bark and No Bite? – covered sanctions enforcement and two further reports will cover:

• the chronic problems surrounding remuneration and retention of key staff on the economic crime beat at the National Crime Agency; and
• current methods of reinvesting the income from fines and asset seizures into economic crime enforcement and how they can be massively scaled up.