“Anger over companies hiding away”, 21 April 2020

Two out of three FTSE 100 companies are holding annual meetings behind closed doors this year, with no opportunity for shareholders to hold directors to account by asking them unfiltered questions in real time. Share Action, the shareholder lobby group, criticised companies such as BAE Systems, HSBC and Next, which were giving shareholders no chance to ask questions by live webcasts at the time of the annual meeting.

While all companies have been hit by coronavirus restrictions, which make the physical presence of more than a handful of shareholders impossible, some are allowing shareholders to ask questions live by webcast and, crucially, ahead of the voting on resolutions. These so-called hybrid meetings are being conducted by, among others, Reckitt Benckiser, Taylor Wimpey and Unilever.

Share Action also was critical of companies that were holding question-and-answer webcast sessions for shareholders, but not at the time of the meeting, which meant they could not be asked questions in time for the votes and in front of other shareholders. Also, the system enabled companies to cherry-pick questions… Other companies holding behind-closed-doors meetings included Barclays, Lloyds and Glaxosmithkline, the registered charity said.