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Charities Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 47:"Page 118, line 22, at end insert—" ““69IA   CONVERSION OF COMMUNITY INTEREST COMPANY (1)   The Secretary of State may by regulations make provision for the conversion of a community interest company into a CIO, and for the CIO’s registration as a charity. (2)   The regulations may, in particular, apply, or apply with modifications specified in the regulations, or disapply, anything in sections 53 to 55 of the Companies (Audit, Investigations and Community Enterprise) Act 2004 or in sections 69G to 69I above.”” The noble Lord said: My Lords, A community interest company, or CIC, is the new type of company introduced by statute in 2004. A CIC cannot, as we have discussed before, have charitable status, but it must carry on its activities for the benefit of the community. There would be no general objection to a CIC’s seeking to become a charity. It may be, therefore, that some CICs would seek to become charities by converting to charitable incorporated organisation, or CIO, form. This amendment allows the Home Secretary to make regulations providing for CICs to convert directly to CIO form. I beg to move.