Rebels take control of M&B
REBEL M&B shareholders have won their battle to gain control of the company’s boardroom after staging a spectacular coup at the firm’s annual general meeting.
Major victim of the behind-the-scenes machinations was chairman Simon Laffin who was ousted from his seat following a successful campaign by majority shareholder Piedmont, investment vehicle for Bahamas-based billionaire Joe Lewis.
In the weeks leading up to yesterday’s meeting, held at Birmingham’s International Convention Centre, Piedmont had held talks with other large shareholders to drum up support for their campaign.
Piedmont, which owns 23% of shares, and Elpida, investment vehicle of Irish racing tycoons, JP McManus and John Magnier, blamed M&B’s management for running up £500m in hedging losses and maintaining a culture of corporate greed.
The opposition campaign reached its climax yesterday and the measure of its success was that almost two-thirds of the shareholders sided with Piedmont to have Mr Laffin replaced.
Mr Laffin, his predecessor Drummond Hall and Tony Bates, a non-executive, were all voted off, replaced by four independent non-executives nominated by Piedmont – John Lovering, recent chairman of Debenhams, Simon Burke, former chief executive of Hamleys, Jeremy Blood, former director of Scottish & Newcastle, and Mike Balfour, founder of Fitness First.
In addition to these four, the new board as voted in yesterday also includes: Adam Fowle, Tim Lankester, Ron Robson and Jeremy Townsend.
Mr Lovering has been elected chairman – preferred choice of Piedmont – and further appointments will be made later.
In a statement immediately after the meeting, Mr Lovering said: “The Board will put recent history behind us and move forward committed to the interests of all shareholders.
“We will conduct a thorough review of the business which will be presented to all shareholders by the end of March.”
He said the review would look at all aspects of the business: the number of brands and their positioning; the efficiency and allocation of capital expenditure; and the level of overhead costs within the business.
The statement continued: “Our main message is to all of our employees in the business. You have focused on delivering great experiences to our customers and we promise to you that the Board will now be a source of leadership and direction not discord and distraction.
“Together we can build upon Mitchells & Butlers’ position as the leading managed pub company.”
The four new directors put out a separate statement later. In it they said they looked forward to working with the company to grow value for all its shareholders.
They added that as some institutional shareholders had expressed concern they were nominated by a shareholder rather than emerging from a Nomination Committee process, they would all stand for election at the next AGM and agreed to stand down if they did not command support from a majority of shareholders, excluding Piedmont.
