Seán Kenny (Dublin North East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am pleased this important legislation is before the House and I am happy to support it. The original Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act was enacted in July 2010. The new Bill transposes the European Union third anti-money laundering directive into Irish law and requires firms and persons subject to its provisions to apply customer due diligence measures. These measures are intended to apply to businesses and banks where large transactions occur. The purpose of lower financial limits for private gambling houses is to prevent such entities from becoming places where money and criminal proceeds are laundered. The inclusion of gambling houses in the legislation is particularly welcome given the discovery during the Mahon tribunal hearings that some of the gentlemen who came before the tribunal had connections to such entities. I recall that one particular gentleman had a connection to a type of casino in O'Connell Street where one arm bandit machines operated. I believe he informed the tribunal he used to visit the premises during his lunch break to see how business was going. I am pleased, therefore, that this type of activity is covered by the legislation.

The Bill also covers the obtaining of information about the business relationship involved in transactions, conducting ongoing monitoring of such business relationships to ensure transactions being conducted are consistent with the knowledge of the customer, the business and risk profile, including, where necessary, the source of funds, and ensuring that documents, data or information held are kept up to date.

Different levels of customer due diligence can be applied. A designated person does not have to identify information on the purpose or intended nature of the business relationship of a customer or beneficial owner where the customer is considered to present a low risk of money laundering or terrorist financing. However, the designated person must obtain sufficient information about the customer to satisfy himself that the customer meets the criteria for this simplified customer due diligence to be applied correctly. In circumstances where a high risk of money laundering or terrorist financing is identified, the designated persons are obliged to undertake customer due diligence measures above and beyond normal measures. These are referred to as enhanced customer due diligence procedures. The extent of the additional information sought and any monitoring carried out in respect of any particular customer will depend on the money laundering or terrorist financing risk the customer is assessed to present.

The EU third anti-money laundering directive prescribes three specific circumstances where enhanced customer due diligence measures must be applied. The first is where the customer has not been physically present for identification purposes, while another is in respect of a correspondent banking relationship. It is noteworthy that the enhanced customer due diligence measures also apply to elected representatives and politically exposed persons in the context of business relationships or occasional transactions. This returns me to the Mahon and Flood tribunals which discovered untoward dealings that would not otherwise have come to light. The promised anti-corruption Bill, which will shortly come before the House, will deal with people who were involved in this type of behaviour. It is preferable, however, to have proper business and banking practices in place to avoid such circumstances arising in the first instance.

A third element of the customer enhanced diligence provisions seeks to prevent political support for terrorism in the parliaments of European Union member states. This is a positive development, particularly in the context of terrorism which is sometimes politically motivated. Elected representatives must be open to scrutiny in this regard, as provided for in the new Bill. I welcome the directive and this supporting legislation and commend the Bill to the House.

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