Of interest to all involved in the arrangement of meetings.

On 13 December, ISS published their UK and Ireland Proxy Voting Guidelines and Benchmark Policy Recommendations, which will be effective for meetings taking place on or after 1 February 2023.

As mentioned in previous Technical Briefings, on 24 May, the Financial Reporting Council published its long anticipated consultation on the UK Corporate Governance Code, the intention of which is to focus on the legislative and governance reforms that the Government proposed in its May 2022 white paper “Restoring trust in audit and corporate governance”. These are designed, amongst other things, to “support the FRC’s transition into the Audit, Reporting and Governance Authority (ARGA).”

In the past two years, businesses have dealt with a series of shocks. The pandemic hit at an est. cost of £134bn to UK businesses.

The Chartered Governance Institute, UK & Ireland, has responded to the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) consultation on the review of the UK Corporate Governance Code (the Code) to urge it to protect the huge benefits of the strong governance environment in the UK, balancing the desire to improve the Code against the proportionality of any additional reporting.

CGI welcomes the plan for a new independent regulator in English football which was announced in the King's Speech but we are concerned that expectations of reform are unrealistically high, and that the Football Governance Bill announced in the King’s Speech on 7th November is promising more than it can possibly deliver.

ICSA: The Chartered Governance Institute is pleased to announce that Victoria Penrice, a chartered governance professional with over thirty years of governance expertise, has been selected to be its new President, effective 1 August 2020.

The Chartered Governance Institute and Bates Wells have today published guidance around the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 which could provide some help to charities, social enterprises and mutuals in financial difficulty. A separate piece of guidance about holding general meetings during the current pandemic has also been published.

The winners of this year’s ICSA Awards were announced at a glittering awards dinner at the Park Lane Hilton in London last night. Hosted by comedian Simon Evans, the awards welcomed 670 of the UK’s leading governance professionals who were there to celebrate the achievements of those organisations, individuals and teams that are leading the way in good governance and corporate reporting.