Rule 314 — Amendment of rules, etc., of fund.
The rule requires prior approval for changes to an approved fund. No alteration in the rules, constitution, objects or conditions of an approved fund shall be made without the prior approval of the approving authority.
Approval is given on the footing of the fund as it stands — its rules, its constitution, its objects and the conditions attached to it. If any of those could be changed afterwards without reference back, the approval would attach to a document that no longer describes the fund. The rule keeps the two together by requiring the approving authority's approval before the change is made.
The approval must come first — the rule bars the alteration from being made without prior approval, so a change made and then submitted for ratification is a change made in breach of the rule. The four subjects are stated widely: the rules, the constitution, the objects and the conditions of the fund, so an amendment to the trust deed and a change in the fund's stated objects are equally caught. The rule does not say what follows from an unapproved alteration, or on what grounds approval may be refused; it fixes the requirement and leaves the consequences to the provisions governing approval of the fund.
The trustees of an approved fund wish to widen the class of employees eligible to join and to change the trustees' investment powers. Both go to the rules and the constitution of the fund, so the approving authority's approval must be obtained before the amendments are executed, not afterwards.
You meet it whenever an approved fund's trust deed or rules are to be amended, in the application to the approving authority that must precede the amendment.
No alteration in the rules, constitution, objects or conditions of an approved fund shall be made without the prior approval of the approving authority.