CBA juggernaut rolls dissenters
January 18, 2008
This Olga Galacho story appeared in The Herald Sun on October 27, 2000, after CBA AGM in Melbourne.
Commonwealth Bank executives were described as "greedy vultures'' during a shareholder pasting over their benefits at a marathon annual meeting in Melbourne yesterday.
But an anticipated rowdy union protest against branch closures was barely a whimper. There were just a few Finance Sector Union members handing leaflets out at the venue entrance and just a handful of questions on staff conditions asked during the meeting.
More than 2000 shareholders squeezed into the Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre for the meeting.
By the time the meeting adjourned for a break, more than four and a half hours after starting, nearly half of the mostly elderly shareholders had quit the gruelling session.
The epic meeting continued after the break to vote on the granting of 250,000 options to managing director David Murray.
He will also be entitled to an extra 42,000 shares under a separate reward plan. Mr Murray, whose total pay is $2.04 million, now owns 50,000 CBA shares, according to the annual report.
Elderly investor Charlotte Woodgate told the directors they were "not seen as an asset to the community, but as greedy, money hungry people''.
Despite shareholder outcry, CBA succeeded in getting approval for an equity reward plan that will see 500 employees, including up to 100 executives, receiving share and options benefits.
Shareholder activist Stephen Mayne, who unsuccessfully stood for a board seat, said that he would like to see executives "in there dying in a ditch for the money they earned''.
Acknowledging that he neither wanted nor expected to win a seat, Mr Mayne said he was running for several boards "where there is a need for questions to be asked''.
Shareholders also approved a change to the dividend reinvestment plan that will see the number of shares issued rounded down to the nearest whole number of shares.
Chairman John Ralph said CBA had decided to keep the plan despite pressure from institutions to scrap it.
Mr Murray answered criticisms of bank closures and escalating fees saying that customers "were being charged less for banking business and there were more points of access to services than ever before''.
He said the squeeze on banks' loan margins had meant costs had had to be transferred to customers who used services.
Mr Murray said the roll-out of Ezy Bank facilities, in Woolworths supermarkets, gave customers easy access to bank services with 50 free transactions a month.
CBA shares yesterday fell 5 to $29.10.
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