Every company, being an insurance company or a deposit provident or benefit society, shall before it commences business, and also on the first Monday in February and the first Tuesday in August in every year during which it carries on business, make a statement in the form set out in Schedule 23, or as near to it as circumstances admit.

A copy of the statement shall be put up in a conspicuous place in the company’s registered office, and in every branch office or place where the business of the company is carried on.

Every member and every creditor of the company is entitled to a copy of the statement, on payment of a sum not exceeding 2 1/2 pence.

If default is made in complying with this section, the company and every officer of it who is in default is liable to a fine and, for continued contravention, to a daily default fine.

For purposes of this Act, a company which carries on the business of insurance in common with any other business or businesses is deemed an insurance company.

In the case of an insurance company to which Part II of the M1Insurance Companies Act 1982 applies, this section does not apply if the company complies with provisions of that Act as to the accounts and balance sheet to be prepared annually and deposited by such a company.

The Secretary of State may, by regulations in a statutory instrument (subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament), alter the form in Schedule 23.