Company Law Reform Bill [HL]

My Lords, I support the amendment, to which my noble friend Lord Sharman and I have added our names. The noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, has made the point very articulately. It is very simple: roughly half the shareholders in UK listed companies now hold their shares through nominee companies. This is an opportunity to ensure that the beneficial owners of those shares can exercise their rights as shareholders, which are very often denied them by the nominee companies. When the annual report arrives, very few nominee companies contact the beneficial owners and ask, ““How do you want us to vote in relation to the shares we hold in your name?”” In fact, very few nominee companies involve the beneficial owners in any decisions regarding the companies in which they hold shares. We will probably not have more companies legislation for another 10 or 20 years, when the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, will undoubtedly be in office but the rest of us will have retired. This is an opportunity to enable shareholders who wish to opt in to a system to exercise their democratic rights, notwithstanding the fact that their shares are held by nominees.