Classifying legal services providers as ‘high risk’ for money laundering is wrong, anti-money laundering specialists told the Law Society’s economic crime conference last week – amid concern over HM Treasury proposals to bolster the AML regime.

Legal services providers were assessed as high risk for money laundering in the 2017, 2020 and 2025 national risk assessments published by the Home Office and HM Treasury. The latest assessment states that law firms are attractive to criminals ‘due to perceptions of the sector’s integrity’.

However, at this week’s conference, Marcus Thompson, a partner at Kirkland & Ellis International who assists corporate clients on anti-money laundering, said he disagreed with the rating. ‘The whole point of becoming a lawyer is the rest of society rightly regards lawyers as people of integrity… who act at a standard above most people in society,’ Thompson said.

Thompson acknowledged that some sectors of the legal economy are more vulnerable than others, but ‘that does not justify the National Risk Assessment of lawyers being at highest risk of money laundering. I think that’s too simplistic’.

HM Treasury

HM Treasury has targeted pooled client accounts as part of an action plan to bolster the UK’s anti-money laundering regime

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Amy Bell, chair of the Society’s economic crime taskforce, said law enforcement agencies have been asked to share examples of where they believe solicitors could have prevented criminals from using their services. ‘Until we have seen that data, it is difficult to say, “Watch out for this”,’ Bell said.

Meanwhile, the Society is expected to push back on Treasury proposals that would require banks to take ‘reasonable measures’ to understand the purpose of the pooled client account, gather sufficient information about each client’s business and assess the risk associated with the account.

Simmons & Simmons partner Amasis Saba, a member of the Society’s taskforce, said the onus will fall on banks to be comfortable about who the beneficial owners are, which could include counterparties. ‘This is an area the Law Society will be pushing back on… Your teams are going to get battered by requests. If you have multiple banks, [that means] multiple requests,’ Saba said.