The idea has been tabled in a Centre Forum publication to be launched on today (9 March) at the Liberal Democrat spring conference in Gateshead.
The ESOP Centre is the lobbying organisation for the employee share plan industry whose members include companies as well as share scheme lawyers, accountants, tax advisers, administrators and consultants.
Centre chairman Malcolm Hurlston said: "A dedicated minister would push employee share ownership into the mainstream and keep it there.The minister would be able to coordinate the work done by HMRC, the Treasury and BIS in this area.
"At the moment the Enterprise Management Incentive, which is a fantastic scheme and has helped over ten thousand businesses to grow, isn't properly promoted by BIS because it was invented in the Treasury. Because of this thousands more businesses are missing out."
The paper proposes a combination of more rigorous promotion and some technical changes to the rules governing share schemes alongside more radical measures such as a right to request up to 5% of share capital for a broad-based employee share scheme in firms with more than 250 employees.
"The more technical suggestions are in line with our own lobbying agenda which has recently been looked at by the Office of Tax Simplification.
"A right to request would mean that companies would have to take employees seriously if they wanted a share plan. Employees deserve a share of the capital to which they contribute so much."
