The success of the U.K.’s latest legislative efforts to tackle financial crime depends on the capability of transforming what is often regarded as one of the country’s most passive regulators into a proactive—even aggressive—prosecuting authority.

Not everyone is convinced such a change can happen quickly, if at all.

The Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act, which became law last month, aims to prevent money laundering and other financial crime. A central tenet of its enforcement program is to give Companies House—up until now a passive registrar of corporate information—the new objective of improving and checking the transparency and accuracy of the information companies provide in its registers.