Evaluating the Effectiveness of the UK Legal Framework in Combating Money Laundering.

Abstract

The UK AML regime meets FATF, UNCAC, and UNTOC requirements, but its effectiveness—key to our research—is disputed. Enforcement is selective, intelligence underutilised, and burdens uneven. The UK has formal compliance but insufficient actual performance compared to EU reforms and FATF follow-ups99, raising questions about whether legislative aim matches the research question of real effectiveness.