Shareholder Votes

Mr. Bellingham
To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what penalties she plans to impose on companies who mislay a significant proportion of shareholders' votes. [124731]

Jacqui Smith
I have no plans to impose penalties on companies. I regard the effective operation of the shareholder voting process as an essential part of the corporate governance framework. The process involves a number of parties and I am glad to see that they are working together to analyse the process in order to make it more efficient. The Department will be monitoring developments in this area closely.