Clause 8
Company Law Reform Bill [Lords]
10:15 am
David Howarth (Shadow Minister (Energy), Trade & Industry; Cambridge, Liberal Democrat)
I welcome you, Mr. Illsley, to the Chair of this important and potentially long-running Committee, and I welcome the Minister to her new post. This must be the most strenuous first Bill that a Minister could have faced in a new job.
I echo the remarks of the hon. Gentleman, who said that the Bill not only clarifies many issues of company law, but is economically important. If such a Bill were to go wrong, it might lose companies millions of pounds in litigation. That is why I support what he said about clause 8.
The company law review has taken a long time, and it has taken up vast amounts of effort—not least the time of many of my erstwhile academic colleagues. Its purpose is to simplify company law. It is surprising that something as obvious as the difference between articles and memorandums of association has not been abolished. Multiplying various documents does not seem to be an obvious way to regulate company law. I therefore ask the Minister why the Government still think it important to have a number of separate documents on registration in respect of not only the clause, but other clauses in this part of the Bill.