A Wānaka man is playing a part in the global fight against dirty money.

Former police officer Nicholas Gilmour has co-authored a book with global crime prevention consultant Tristram Hicks to raise people’s understanding of the issue and identify some solutions.

The War On Dirty Money shows that billions of dollars are wasted each year trying to prevent dirty money (money derived from crime) entering a financial system that is already awash with it. 

Nicholas and Tristram challenge the global approach, arguing that complacency, self-interest and misunderstanding have created long-standing absurdities in the fight.

Nicholas told The Outlet Podcast that his background in policing (including work as a policing advisor in the Middle East) and financial intelligence, combined with 20 years of reading and research on the topic, provided a good opportunity to collaborate with Tristram on the book.

The book outlines 20 different categories of crime including environmental crimes, high street robbery, trafficking, online exploitation, and various frauds.

“All those crimes generate financial wealth - what is essentially the dirty money going into the legitimate financial system,” he said.

“In trying to prevent it we’re talking over US$200B a year in the war against dirty money.”

This money funds a compliance industry involving hundreds of thousands of people, but the book “pulls back the covers” from any reassurance that that industry is effective.

“You shouldn’t be reassured that compliance is actually solving these problems. These industries … their job is to meet compliance obligations, their job is not to prevent money laundering.”

International and government policy makers inadvertently facilitate tax evasion, corruption, environmental and organised crime by separating crime from its root cause, he and Tristram allege. 

The handful of crime fighters that exist are starved of resources while an army of compliance box tickers are prevented from truly helping. 

Nicholas says Hollywood is attracted to the notion of money laundering, and a show like Osark (a drama series about a financial planner whose money-laundering scheme went wrong) is “not too far off”.

“The challenge is we’re 30 years into this war on dirty money. We’re dealing with the war on 200 battlefields, some of the people on these battlefields do not actually know they’re in a war on dirty money, they’re working to a completely different definition.

“If we don’t have a global understanding of what exactly is money laundering we’re wrong from page one of the battle,” he said.

The best thing about the book, Nicholas said, is it’s not “a book of criticisms, it’s a book of solutions”.

“We provide a toolbox of solutions at the end.”

The War On Dirty Money is available via Bristol University Press and online. It is out now.