So if we're talking about big-scale money laundering, I don't think Binance is the first choice for criminals.
Not knowing how many and how big money laundering cases are in the UK, the few that are published doesn't mean there aren't any which may actually be difficult to uncover. Given the good liquidity of binance and the withdrawal requirement of 2 BTC per day for 1 account, it is impossible for criminals to ignore this opportunity.
Also, instead of outright banning Binance, the UK authorities could've imposed their own rules, such as obligatory KYC for everyone from the UK. But no, they just banned one of the most reputable exchanges in the world, and the one which actually tries to comply with regulations of various countries and to operate transparently..
Binance has always been a good mirror for platforms of its kind because it is the one that best meets global legal requirements in the view of many. You should also keep in mind that binance recently launched the NFT marketplace right in June, the AFC issued a ban in June (cmiiw). You can certainly see the connection. I got a lot of rumors that NFT products are good "tools" for laundering money.