On 20 July 2022, HM Treasury published the Terms of Reference for the Digitisation Taskforce.
On 19 July 2022, the Government announced that it would be taking forward Mark Austin’s Secondary Capital Raising Review (SCRR) recommendation to establish a taskforce driving forward full digitisation of shareholdings, led by an independent, neutral chair.
The objectives of the Digitisation Taskforce include:
- Identifying immediate and longer term means of improving on the current intermediated system of share ownership.
- Eliminating the use of paper share certificates for traded companies and mandating the use of additional options to cheques for cash remittances.
- Considering whether the arrangements for digitisation can be extended to newly formed private companies and as an optional route for existing UK private companies.
The Taskforce will be chaired by Sir Douglas Flint. It will be for the Chair to decide the composition of the Taskforce and to determine the processes that will be followed in order to address its objectives. The Chair is asked to provide a public report on the Taskforce’s progress and initial findings by spring 2023, and to publicly set out final recommendations and an implementation plan by spring 2024.
