Vote against Nationwide’s bumper pay packets
Posted on June 27th, 2010
‘Our members’ needs set our agenda’.
So the mighty Nationwide Building Society introduces its 2010 report and accounts – a summary of which should be landing on the doormat of every Nationwide member as I write this blog (poor old Mr Postman and Postwoman).
If only these same hard pressed members – hard pressed in the sense of reeling from both meagre savings rates and the aftermath of Osborne’s emergency Budget – could set the agenda when it comes to boardroom pay.
I have just printed off Nationwide’s 2010 accounts (available by visiting nationwide.co.uk and clicking on ‘explorenationwide’) and although the printer has burnt out spewing out 164 pages and more, it’s pages 62 to 67 that are the most fascinating. These detail the directors’ remuneration for the financial year just gone.
Talking big picture first. In the year to 4 April 2010, the non-executives were rewarded with fees totalling £871,000, an increase on the year before when they collectively received £829,000.
As for the executives (the day to day people responsible for running the society) they received remuneration totalling just over £ 8m. Given there were seven individuals (all men) who served as executives during the year, this works out at about £1,155,000 per person. Last year, the executive team received remuneration of £6,573,000. So, in effect, the executive team saw collective remuneration jump by 23%.
Now, of course, Nationwide will no doubt come back and argue that the 2010 figures are distorted by a £1,772,000 settlement to Stuart Bernau who immediately went off to oversee the Chelsea’s merger into rival building society Yorkshire.
But the fact remains that directors Tony Prestedge, Mark Rennison, David Rigney and Matthew Wyles all saw their remuneration jump by leaps and bounds in the year to April 4. Only Graham Beale, chief executive, saw his remuneration drop – by a smidgeon – from £1,550,000 to £1,539,000. What’s a £11,000 cut when you earning these sums of money?
Austerity? Challenging times? Tightening of belts? Forget it. Not at Nationwide.
What sticks in the craw is that all the executives bar Bernau received mouth watering annual performances last year as well as medium term bonuses. What for? The society saw its profits fall and if Financial Mail’s mailbag is a barometer of customer satisfaction, Nationwide’s service levels remain woefully behind the curve.
Nationwide’s customers have an ideal opportunity to register their disquiet over executive remuneration at the forthcoming AGM on July 22.
Not by turning up at the AGM in London and venting their spleen – which of course every member is entitled to do (venue: Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre, London). But by specifically voting AGAINST the directors’ remuneration report in the voting form they received with their summary 2010 accounts.
In its clever adverts currently running on ITV, Nationwide talks about being ‘proud to different’ …. ‘your views count’ …. and ‘your values are our values’.
Well, my retort to that is: let your views count by voting AGAINST boardroom largesse at the Nationwide. Certainly, when it comes to boardroom pay, Nationwide Building Society is no different to any of our disgraced banks. It’s excessive and untenable. It is time for Nationwide’s board to receive a reality check.
Jeff Prestridge, Personal Finance Editor Financial Mail on Sunday
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