---

Company Law Reform Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 82:"Page 402, line 37, at end insert—" ““(   )   The order has the effect of making the body appointed under subsection (1) designated under section 5 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (c. 36) (further powers to designate public authorities).”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 83 I shall speak also to Amendment No. 83. These amendments have the effect of making the Freedom of Information Act apply to the two bodies to which the Secretary of State will delegate his functions. Amendment No. 82 relates to the independent supervisor and, more importantly, Amendment No. 83 relates to a body that we believe will be the Public Oversight Board. Only yesterday, the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor made a speech in which he said that he was proud of the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act. His department issued a report on the progress that has been made in implementation. That showed that while there is still more to do—for example, on the timetable taken to reply to requests—the implementation has, in general, been without problems. However, the Government continue to say that they are still reviewing the implementation of the Act before extending it beyond government departments and the bodies initially included. We believe that when a Minister delegates his functions to a body, whether a public sector body or not, it is right that the Freedom of Information Act rights and responsibilities also follow. Put another way, it would be wrong if a government department could avoid the operation of the Act by choosing to delegate functions in a particular way rather than carry them out directly. So as a matter of principle we think that the Act should apply to cases such as the delegation of functions to the independent supervisor and the Public Oversight Board. More substantively, we have a very real belief that the performance of audit firms, which will be a function of the Public Oversight Board, ought to be in the public domain. If we are to have confidence in the role of auditors underpinning the strength of our capital markets, it makes no sense at all to keep auditor performance behind the closed doors of the Public Oversight Board. As the noble Lord, Lord Sharman, and I have explained in Grand Committee and at Report, audit committees of listed companies bear a big responsibility to oversee the appointment of auditors and their work. How can audit committees discharge that responsibility if important information is kept from them? How can they rationally carry out a tender for an audit if they cannot compare the relative performance of auditors as judged by a knowledgeable external body? These two amendments are in the public interest. I beg to move.