1601. (1) Without prejudice to the requirements of Chapter 13 of Part 6, where an applicable company is subject to the requirements of section 1590 or 1596 –

(a) a copy of the directors’ report, including any group directors’ report, referred to in section 347(1)(b) shall be annexed to the annual return in the electronic reporting format referred to in section 1600, and

(b) a copy of the assurance report on the sustainability reporting in that directors’ report shall, in addition to the documents referred to in section 347, be annexed to the annual return.

(2) Subsections (2) to (4) of section 347 shall apply to the documents referred to in subsection (1) in the same manner as they apply to the documents referred to in subsection (1) of section 347 and for that purpose, a reference in those subsections to subsection (1) of section 347 shall be construed as a reference to subsection (1) of this section.]