Legal & General vs workers on boards

A little bit of news about workers on boards (or the lack of them) in the UK. Legal & General is the first big PLC that I have seen set out how it will address workforce engagement.

Perhaps no big surprise, but they have adopted the nominated NED option:

The Company is also pleased to announce the appointment of Lesley Knox as designated non-executive director for engagement with the Company's workforce, in line with the provisions of the UK Corporate Governance Code (July 2018), with immediate effect. Lesley is currently Chair of the Company's Remuneration Committee and so is well-placed to engage effectively with the Company's workforce.

And it's also worth remembering that is in line with the position adopted by its asset management business LGIM.

The introduction of an employee sitting on a Board or establishing a shareholder committee, in our view, would significantly change the current roles and responsibilities of directors and shareholders. We continue to support the Unitary Board model in the UK and focus our efforts on how Board effectiveness can be improved within the current governance structure. In saying this, we also understand that directors should be accountable to other stakeholders including employees. One way in which there can be better alignment between employees and shareholders is for Boards to better understand the sentiment of employees in the organisation. This can be done by nominating one of the current independent Non-Executive Directors (a “Nominated Employee Non-Executive Director”) to be held accountable for seeking out employees views in the business. This nominated director will have responsibilities to meet with staff at different levels and report back to the Board the findings. Furthermore, in the Annual Report, the Nominated Employee Non-Executive Director should also provide a statement and report back to shareholders at the AGM or Annual Report of what he/she has done to fulfil their remit.

Equally obviously this is going to fall a long way short of the expectations of unions and other advocates of meaningful worker representation. It will be interesting to see if other PLCs follow suit. I can imagine some tension ahead.

Finally, on a related note, there's a piece in the Evening Standard opposing workers on boards and supporting L&G's alternative. There's an interesting bit suggesting that opponents of workers on boards have argued against by reference to directors' duties:

Businesses successfully lobbied that being forced to hire a workers’ rep as a director would make them hostage to unions and get in the way of fleet-footed decision-making.
Besides, they pointed out, the law says directors’ primary duty is to shareholders, not staff. So, under Section 172 of the Companies Act, a director charged with looking out for workers’ interests above all else is breaking the rules.

I think this is a bit off target. For one, as currently formulated the Companies Act does give priority to shareholders but also says they've got to consider impact on workers, environment etc. In addition, if the claim above were true then First Group would have been in breach of the Companies Act for years, since it has a worker on its main board.

Nonetheless, if corporate lobbyists are using this as an argument (and I've also seen section 172 prayed in aid of tax avoidance, large bonuses at banks etc) then it strengthens the case for reform of directors' duties in any case.

PS. Here's what the Companies Act 1985 (section 309) said about directors' duties to employees:

309Directors to have regard to interests of employees

(1)The matters to which the directors of a company are to have regard in the performance of their functions include the interests of the company's employees in general, as well as the interests of its members.

(2)Accordingly, the duty imposed by this section on the directors is owed by them to the company (and the company alone) and is enforceable in the same way as any other fiduciary duty owed to a company by its directors.

(3)This section applies to shadow directors as it does to directors.