Nationwide board pay goes to vote

GROWING public anger over boardroom fat cats will be highlighted this week at Nationwide building society's annual meeting.

About 200,000 members are understood to have voted against chief executive Philip Williamson's £838,000 pay package.

The vote is the society's first on directors' remuneration. The results will be revealed at the annual meeting on Thursday.

Nationwide is not obliged to poll members on pay. It is conducting the ballot voluntarily and though the society would not comment, there is little chance of the pay policy being overturned.

SHAREHOLDERS are ignoring Government pressure to vote at annual meetings, despite high profile rows over fat cat pay and widespread concern about rewards for failure, writes Lisa Buckingham.

In the latest annual meeting season, only 30% of shareholders voted - a dramatic fall from 55% the year before.

That was despite extraordinary displays of shareholder power such as the vote against the multi-million-pound pay package proposed by GlaxoSmithKline for chief executive Jean-Pierre Garnier.

The figures, from electronic voting service Crest, also reveal a sharp reversal of the trend that has seen the voting rate climb from about 45% over the past five years. Mounting cost pressures on fund managers, which have seen their revenues crash with falling stock markets, are believed to be a major factor behind the failure to vote. The level of 'lost votes' also has soared. For every five votes fund managers cast this year, only one arrived.

Michael Kempe, head of issuer and investor services at Crest, said: 'If voting doesn't pick up, the pressure to introduce compulsory balloting could be enormous.'