{"id":21950,"date":"2013-07-26T13:54:38","date_gmt":"2013-07-26T13:54:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=c8caa3057a1f8406795d0437c15b718f"},"modified":"2013-07-26T13:54:38","modified_gmt":"2013-07-26T13:54:38","slug":"press-release-government-launches-consultation-on-helping-industrial-and-provident-societies-to-grow-and-succeed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=21950","title":{"rendered":"Press release: Government launches consultation on helping Industrial and Provident Societies to grow and succeed"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<div class=\"call-to-action\">\n<p><a href=\"\/government\/consultations\/industrial-and-provident-societies-growth-through-co-operation\">Read the <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> consultation<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> (commonly referred to as co-operatives) are non-profit making organisations that operate for the benefit of their members. Members have an equal say and share of the profits, regardless of share size. <\/p>\n<p>The <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> structure is currently used in a variety of sectors, from football clubs in the lower leagues to new sectors, such as renewable energy. Organisations are increasingly attracted to the use of an <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> structure as it is the only corporate structure that guarantees one-member-one-vote democratic governance, and brings with it a number of exemptions from administrative requirements that are placed on shareholder-owned companies.<\/p>\n<p>This package of reforms will ensure that the legislation works effectively for old and new companies alike wishing to use the <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> structure to grow. <\/p>\n<p>The consultation seeks views on a range of measures including:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p>Raising the cap on the maximum amount of withdrawable capital that an individual member can hold in an <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> \u2013 the so-called \u2018withdrawable share capital limit\u2019 \u2013 which is currently set at \u00a320,000. Increasing the withdrawable share capital limit will enable <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> to raise capital more easily. Members of capital intensive industries, such as agriculture and energy production, will be able to invest more and allow the society to grow. The government is seeking views on the appropriate level. <\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Introducing insolvency rescue procedures for <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr>. Currently, it is not possible for an <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> to go into administration; enabling them to do so will increase the chance of rescue while still in operation for troubled <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr>, and so help safeguard investors. This will also ease access for <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> to the Pension Protection Fund, into which they currently pay more than \u00a32 million every year. Significantly, the ability to go into administration will enable football clubs in the Premier League and Football League to use the <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> structure for the first time. Several lower league English football clubs operate using an <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> structure, with fans at the the heart of how the club is run, but these football clubs are currently prohibited from entry to the top 4 leagues of English football, because they are unable to go into insolvency proceedings to restructure. <\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Sajid Javid said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"last-child\">Co-operatives provide an important alternative business model. The sector is expanding rapidly, so it is vital that we provide Co-operatives with the framework that they need to grow and succeed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h3 id=\"notes-to-editors\">Notes to editors<\/h3>\n<ol>\n<li>There are a number of other measures also being consulted on in this consultation:\n<ul>\n<li>Introducing additional insolvency rescue procedures for Credit Unions. This will help the Financial Service Compensation Scheme (<abbr title=\"Financial Service Compensation Scheme\">FSCS<\/abbr>) to gain a quicker payout for depositors in the event that a credit union gets into difficulty.<\/li>\n<li>Reproducing Companies Act provisions for <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> with regard to investigative powers of the registrar (the Financial Conduct Authority or <abbr title=\"Financial Conduct Authority\">FCA<\/abbr>). This would allow the <abbr title=\"Financial Conduct Authority\">FCA<\/abbr> to act more effectively when it perceived evidence of misconduct at <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr>.<\/li>\n<li>Reproducing Companies Act provisions onto <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> with regard to inspection of the register of members. This would prevent cases of vexatious use of the register by disaffected members. <\/li>\n<li>Allowing electronic, rather than paper, submission of <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr> registration documents to the <abbr title=\"Financial Conduct Authority\">FCA<\/abbr>. This reduces cost and time for societies when registering.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Alongside these measures, parts of the 2010 Co-operatives and Community Benefit Societies and Credit Unions Act will be commenced. This will change the name of <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> to Co-operatives officially.<\/li>\n<li>Sitting alongside this package of measures is the Co-operatives Consolidation Bill. This legislation will be introduced in late 2013, and will bring all existing legislation for <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Societies\">IPSs<\/abbr> in one place. This will reduce complexity, and make it easier to set up an <abbr title=\"Industrial and Provident Society\">IPS<\/abbr>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government has today published a consultation on a number of measures to support the Industrial and Provident Societies (IPS) sector and remove barriers to growth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21950"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21950\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}