Clause 49 - Powers
Proceeds of Crime Bill
10:00 am
Mr Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster, Conservative)
I shall speak simply to say that I agree with my hon. Friend. I appreciate what the Government are trying to achieve. The restraint period will be long drawn out, and significant expenses will be incurred. If large amounts of assets are under restraint, those assets should be available for the remuneration of a receiver. It should be remembered, however, that in any insolvency situation professional advisers have a prior claim. That is analogous, if not directly comparable. None the less, it would be inconvenient, apart from anything else, if assets were sold at what would inevitably be a knock-down sale price, and the restraint order and confiscation order then moved in the opposite direction. It would cause great embarrassment to the authorities if it was discovered that hundreds of thousands of pounds of undervalued assets had been sold off to pay fees, and the end result was the reimbursement of a defendant. It seems common sense that in the first instance, the state, rather than the assets of the defendant, should pay the fees over what should normally be a short period.