VOTE now! Proposed take over of Virgin Money - Nationwide members should be given a vote

masonic

masonic said:

Last year there was a bit of a protest vote around the (un)fairer share payment. The hardest hit resolution was approval of the Directors' Remuneration Report, with the following breakdown:

    For: 503,024 (95.07%)
    Against: 26,079 (4.93%)
    Votes withheld*: 8,081
    (Total members: over 16 million)

Even though over 26,079 voted against, it still enjoyed over 95% approval. The nature of the system makes it near impossible for any group to influence the result.

Things have gone a bit quiet with the campaign, but I was interested in seeing if there was a detectable impact on AGM voting this year. Once again, the Directors' Remuneration took the biggest hit - the Report:

• For: 604,654 (95.05%)
• Against: 31,459 (4.95%)
• Votes withheld*: 9,421

Looks like 0.02% more voting against this year. 

Things were slightly worse for the Policy (wasn't included as a resolution in 2023, but data for 2022 shown):

• For: 601,014 (94.61%)    [2022: For: 487,138 (93.53%)]
• Against: 34,260 (5.39%) [2022: Against: 33,707 (6.47%)]
• Votes withheld*: 10,258 [2022: Votes withheld*: 8,851]

So actually an improvement on the previous vote.

WillPS

~105k more people voted than last time, of which ~98k voted to support the board.

Hopefully Armstrong and the newspapers blindly regurgitating his campaign diatribes get the message, he doesn't speak for us.

Beddie

I'd be interested in the figures without the "quick vote" option included - a much less overwhelming vote For, I'd say.

Malthusian

Beddie said:

I'd be interested in the figures without the "quick vote" option included - a much less overwhelming vote For, I'd say.

If you wanted to vote For, why would you not use the quick vote option? People who want to vote For aren't going to vote in a more inconvenient way just to demonstrate how much they love the board.

I'm not disputing that the "Quick Vote" system is stacking the deck (I've said it myself in this thread), but the fact that relatively few For votes were cast manually (probably) doesn't prove anything. 

The reality of any society or business like this is that the members / shareholders almost always wave everything through unless the directors are really screwing up, with or without rigging the votes. 

masonic

I suppose the effect of forcing an active choice on each motion would be fewer content individuals voting, which would amplify any dissent.

Pineapple999

I have accounts with them both and am happy with both, but my question would be - what will happen when they merge and I have a regular saver with both of them? You’re not allowed to have two regular savers? 

wmb194

Pineapple999 said:

I have accounts with them both and am happy with both, but my question would be - what will happen when they merge and I have a regular saver with both of them? You’re not allowed to have two regular savers? 

They'll be run as separate entities, I wouldn't worry.

masonic

Pineapple999 said:

I have accounts with them both and am happy with both, but my question would be - what will happen when they merge and I have a regular saver with both of them? You’re not allowed to have two regular savers? 

Your regular savers will mature long before this becomes an issue.