Every business man and professional will have come into contact with the money laundering regulations. I certainly have as a solicitor, although I note that solicitors are responsible for only some 9 per cent. of reports to NCIS. The provisions therefore affect a large proportion of people conducting business. I call for balance and proportionality. I accept, of course, that money laundering regulations are important in the fight against international crime. I also appreciate that these provisions are aimed at   smoothing some of the rougher edges that have appeared out of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, but I do not feel that they go far enough. To that extent, I support the thrust of the amendments proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Beaconsfield. This area needs to be kept under review. I was pleased to hear the Minister say that she has been consulting and listening to those affected. The Government need to continue to do so.

What is the problem that we have? I was talking recently to the managing—we will call it company X—who purchased another company. Company X considered that there was a breach of contract in its purchase agreement on the acquisition and brought a warranty claim against the sellers. The lawyers for company X insisted to the managing director that the sellers should be reported to NCIS for possible breaches of the Proceeds of Crime Act, even though no crime had been seen and there was no evidence that a crime had been committed.

The managing director of company X wanted to settle the matter—he was a business man and wanted to move on, but he was unable to do so because his own professionals were telling him that they had to report the case to the NCIS. That was a situation in which no crime was suggested, and it arose simply because the professionals acting for the company sensed a bad smell in what they found. The implications of not reporting the matter are so tough in this country that even though those professionals did not see any kind of offence, they did not want to take the risk. One might think, so what? The problem is that an innocent party suffered delay and loss of money and is now less likely to want to conduct business in this country.

We need to start to put this matter in proportion, because it is a significant issue for business in the UK. So far, 150,000 reports have been made under the legislation. In the same period, eight reports were made in Germany, and 50 in France. We need to appreciate that the legislation is disrupting business in the UK—for both business men and professionals—in a way in which it does not in other European countries. It is estimated that compliance costs related to the legislation have reached £100 million. We once again see examples of the UK gold-plating and heavily reinforcing regulations, some of which come out of Europe, at the expense of our compliant and honest business people.