Company Law Reform Bill [HL]

In putting this Question, I ask also whether Clauses 790 to 805 should stand part of the Bill. I seek to establish exactly what it is that this part of the Bill seeks to cover. The Bill sets out to reform the law relating to companies, while Chapter 1 of Part 32 applies to persons, including individuals, partnerships and corporate bodies. Chapter 2 applies to individuals and partnerships only and does not apply to corporate bodies at all. It seems that the root cause of all of this is that the Bill seeks to deal with matters that are currently covered by the Business Names Act 1985, which applies to business names used by any person, not just companies. In relation to Chapter 1, comparable provisions for companies registered under the Companies Acts are already contained in Part 5 of the Bill which deals with company names. For example, Clause 790 is comparable with Clause 55, and it even bears approximately the same heading. The inclusion in an enactment relating to companies of provisions that do not relate to companies at all is bound to cause confusion. We suggest that the provisions which relate to persons other than companies registered under the Companies Acts should be removed to a separate piece of legislation.