9.—(1) The central management shall be responsible for creating the conditions and means necessary for the setting up of an arrangement for the information and consultation of employees, as required by section 8 (1), in a Community-scale undertaking and a Community-scale group of undertakings.

(2) Subject to subsection (3), where the central management is not located in a Member State, the central management’s representative agent in the State, which must be the management of an establishment or part-undertaking of the undertaking or group of undertakings and nominated in writing for that purpose by the central management if not otherwise appointed, shall assume the responsibility referred to in subsection (1).

(3) In the absence of a representative referred to in subsection (2), the management of the establishment or group undertaking in which the greatest number of employees are employed in any one Member State shall assume the responsibility referred to in subsection (1).

(4) For the purposes of this Act, the representative or representatives or, in the absence of any such representative, the management referred to in subsection (3), shall be regarded as the central management.