My Lords, the majority of these amendments are minor and technical and designed to improve the clarity of the legislation.
Amendment 84AHH is substantive and I shall make the case for it first. It amends new Section 226E of the Companies Act 2006, which would be inserted by Clause 72. New Section 226E imposes a potential liability on directors who authorise an unapproved remuneration or loss of office payment. This amendment will ensure that, as is consistent with other provisions in the Companies Act 2006, a director who acts honestly and reasonably may be relieved of this liability if a court, taking into account all the circumstances, decides that it is appropriate to do so.
Noble Lords will understand the need for there to be legal consequences in the event of a company making a payment to a director which has not been approved by shareholders. In the first instance, the company may seek to recover the unauthorised payment from the director who received it. However, if this is unsuccessful, the directors who authorised the payment can be held liable for any losses incurred as a result. The company or its shareholders may take action to recover these losses from them. These consequences will act as a deterrent to the minority of directors who might deliberately try to pay more than shareholders have approved. However, the Government recognise that directors may make honest and reasonable mistakes, either through misinformation or misinterpretation of the remuneration policy. This is recognised in other parts of the Companies Act, which deal with unauthorised payments and under which directors who act honestly, or take reasonable steps to ensure compliance, are not subject to liability.
Unless we make a similar provision with respect to remuneration payments the risk of liability could hang over remuneration committees and affect the pay-setting process. This risks making remuneration committees heavily dependent on lawyers and overly keen to agree broad, vague policies. More worryingly, there is a real risk that this could deter good people from taking up important and challenging roles on remuneration committees. Case law shows that the courts apply a rigorous test when assessing whether a director has acted honestly and reasonably, particularly when the director concerned is one of a large public company. As such, we are confident that this provision will ensure that those directors who should rightly be relieved may be, while ensuring that those who should be held liable, are not.
We have also proposed a handful of minor and technical amendments which will clarify the legal drafting of the Bill on three issues, which I will speak to in turn. Amendments 84AHB, 84AHC and 84AHK clarify how and when Clauses 71 to 74 affect companies that become quoted after these provisions come into force. Amendments 84AHE, 84AHF and 84AHK make clear the different procedures that should be followed in the event of unapproved payments in the form of shares, property and other undertakings of the company. Finally, Amendments 84AHD, 84AHJ, 84AHL, 84AHM and 84AHN tidy up the drafting by moving some of the provisions in Clause 74 into other clauses so that they may appear alongside the sections to which they apply. I hope that noble Lords will support this. I beg to move Amendment 84AHB.