Chorus of protest grows over BP boss’s pay

The outcry against BP chief Bob Dudley’s $19.6m pay intensified as another shareholder group labelled the deal as “too high”.

London - The outcry against BP boss Bob Dudley's $19.6m (£13.8m) pay intensified on Monday as another shareholder group labelled the deal as “simply too high”.

Dudley's vast pay - coming in a year that the company lost $6.4bn and shed 5 000 jobs in the wake of a plunging oil price - has triggered a storm of protest among investors.

The board has so far refused to back down over the deal ahead of the company's annual meeting this Thursday. The vote on the remuneration report is non-binding, but a vote against would be a serious embarrassment for the FTSE 100 giant. Shareholders have to wait until next year to vote on BP's pay policy.

A spokesman for ShareSoc, a mutual which represents individual investors said: “We consider the pay of the chief executive to be simply too high, and particularly so in a year when the company suffered a record loss. Even so his pay went up 20 percent.”

It also attacked BP's “excessively complex” remuneration scheme, which includes six performance measures to calculate bonuses.

Last week, Royal London Asset Management branded the proposed rise in Dudley's pay as “unreasonable and insensitive” and said it would vote against the report. Shareholder advisor Pirc has called his package “highly excessive” and “not acceptable”.

Institutional Shareholder Services and Glass Lewis also recommended BP investors reject the packages, although the company has defended its stance on boardroom pay despite rising ire among investors.

THE INDEPENDENT