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Company Law Reform Bill [HL]

Before the noble Lord, Lord Freeman, withdraws the amendment, I will respond to the comments made by the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General on the reasons why the Government went down this road. They have decided in advance, because of the company law reform and an internal decision, that they are not going to listen to the arguments for the wider social responsibilities that we would like to place on directors under Clause 156(3). The noble and learned Lord suggests that, if we want to impose those obligations, it must be done in other legislation. As my noble friend Lord Razzall commented to me before we came into Committee, however, this is the first major reform of the duties of directors in the past 200 years. We are not going to have another opportunity to do it. I give the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General warning that there is a big constituency out there that believes that the Government have got it wrong. There are nine million members of the organisations that helped us with this series of amendments. They will not be satisfied with the noble and learned Lord’s reply, and we shall return to this on Report.