Enabling disclosure orders for money laundering investigations
A disclosure order is an order authorising a law enforcement officer to require anyone that they think has relevant information to an investigation, to answer questions, provide information or to produce documents. They are used to gather the information required for a successful criminal investigation, although statements made in response to an order may not – subject to certain exceptions – be used in criminal proceedings against the person who gave the information. A person subject to an order is not required to provide privileged or excluded material.
	Disclosure orders are already used in confiscation investigations and a similar power is used by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) in fraud investigations. The Act extends their use to money laundering investigations. The Act also amends the application authorisation process that exists in England, Wales and Northern Ireland by transferring this function from a prosecutor to a senior officer in the investigator’s own organisation (this arrangement does not apply in Scotland).