Debate meaning

This checklist sets out guidance on the issues and dialogue at Annual General Meetings (AGMs) of listed companies and AIM companies. It spans legal considerations, corporate governance best practice and pragmatic pointers, together with advice for the chair and company secretary on preparing for debate and unforeseen occurrences at a company’s AGM effectively. The chair presiding over the meeting is charged with steering discussion during the meeting and must act in a neutral fashion. It falls to the chair to keep debate in check and determine when to bring discussion on a specific item to a close once they judge it has been aired fully and allowed a spectrum of opinions to be expressed. While the UK belonged to the EU, Directive 2007/36/EC (the Shareholder Rights Directive) enshrined shareholders’ entitlement to receive answers to questions at general meetings put to them. That Directive was brought into force in the UK through the Companies (Shareholders' Rights) Regulations 2009, which amended Part 13 of the Companies Act 2006 (CA 2006)...

Honduras rejects the ICSID Convention In recent weeks, Honduras announced it would repudiate the international treaty under which it consented to submit disputes to the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSD), better known as the ICSID Convention. The move followed the country being hit last year with nine distinct ICSID claims, among them a politically charged action brought by a US-based developer seeking up to US$10.7bn in compensation. Honduras now mirrors three other Latin American states that have denounced the ICSID Convention: Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela. Across Europe, parliament have also been keen to jettison investment arbitration in favour of a new investor court, promising reforms they believe could rebalance a regime that critics often say tilts towards investors. India, South Africa and New Zealand have likewise taken steps in recent years to curb their exposure to investor–state disputes, so at first sight it may seem these Latin American moves are part of a worldwide revolt against investor–state arbitration. Yet that impression would overlook a...

In this issue: Criminal procedure and evidence Proceeds of crime Appeal and judicial review Sentencing Bribery, corruption, sanctions and export controls Cybercrime and data protection offences Environmental offences Financial services and pensions offences Food safety and hygiene offences Fraud, forgery, tax and theft offences Health and safety and corporate manslaughter offences Local authority prosecutions Money laundering International LexTalk®Corporate Crime: a Lexis®Nexis community Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Criminal procedure and evidence Court delays soar as backlogs break records Between April and June 2025, the criminal courts in England and Wales amassed an unprecedented caseload of almost 440,000, with incoming matters exceeding disposals and a system hampered by long-standing funding shortfalls. In response, the Ministry of Justice (MOJ), together with The Rt Hon David Lammy MP, confirmed extra resources to accelerate outcomes for...

Original news Brown v Bower [2017] EWHC 2637 (QB) Key point The judge observed (at para [44] of the judgment) that this matter vividly exemplifies the difficulty and complexity of deciding whether conduct is, when measured against society’s overall standards, immoral. In particular, he remarked (at para [46]) that the question of whether it is defamatory to assert of a person that they have paid people for consensual sex is contentious, and remains a matter for debate in various quarters still. The court was not invited to determine whether the meaning of the impugned statement was defamatory at common law, but the...

This Practice Note outlines the function commonly undertaken by tribunal secretaries (also called arbitral or administrative secretaries) within international arbitration. It further looks at who fills the secretary role, highlights issues that have emerged regarding their engagement, and the extent to which certain institutional arbitration rules provide for their use. It also examines who ordinarily performs the secretary position and in what capacity. Provision for their engagement under certain institutional arbitration rules is likewise considered. The Practice Note does not take a position on whether appointing tribunal secretaries is appropriate. It does not endorse or oppose their use. Rather, it describes the tasks tribunal secretaries typically carry out, considers who is most suitably placed to do so, briefly addresses recurring concerns linked to their involvement, and records recent developments relating to their use by reference to selected institutional rules. For analysis of the pros and cons of employing tribunal secretaries, see Practice Notes: —the advantages and disadvantages and Appointment arbitration tribunal secretary—Checklist for considerations on appointment of a tribunal secretary....

Background and introduction to SEPA After the euro was introduced in 11 EU countries in 1999, it became evident that domestic and cross-border retail payment services did not deliver comparable service levels. In September 1999, the European Central Bank (ECB) issued a report on enhancing cross-border retail payment services (the ECB 1999 Report). The report recognised that cross-border credit transfers within the euro area lagged significantly behind domestic credit transfers, even though a single currency environment called for a Single European Payment Area (SEPA). To initiate the debate and send a clear signal to the banking and payment systems industry, the Eurosystem (consisting of the ECB and the national central banks of countries that had adopted the euro) set out seven objectives for the industry to meet: Improved systems/services to be in place by 1 January 2002 Place priority on cross-border credit transfers Substantially lower the price of cross-border credit transfers Ensure settlement times are comparable for domestic and cross-border payments As...

Scope of this Practice Note This Practice Note sets out the main types of radioactive waste and examines disposal against the EU-defined waste hierarchy. It places contemporary management of radioactive waste within the historical development of the nuclear industry from a planning standpoint. Principal policy documents are reviewed to chart the evolution of government thinking over time. Geological disposal of Higher Activity Waste (HAW) under the Planning Act 2008 (PA 2008) is compared with alternative disposal routes under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (TCPA 1990) and the Planning (Wales) Act 2015. Consultation duties, application processes and required consents are identified for both regimes. Notable planning appeals and judicial review cases are highlighted before looking at international approaches to radioactive waste. What is radioactive waste? In the UK, radioactive waste arises—and will arise—from past, current and future programmes for electricity generation from nuclear fission, the reprocessing of nuclear fuel, the development of nuclear weapons, the nuclear submarine fleet and wastes from radioactive materials used for civil...

Social media Social media platforms and services provide powerful means to bolster our brands, advertise our products and services, and cultivate relationships with our existing customers and potential clients. They enable open dialogue, debate, and the exchange and circulation of information. Within this Code, ‘social media’ refers to evolving, socially interactive, networked information and communication technologies that enable personal details, viewpoints, or other material to be displayed for public viewing on the Internet, and shared openly with audiences. This covers social networks or platforms, community websites, blogs, microblogging services, wikis, web forums, social bookmarking tools, and user review services...