EXTRACT: This week BP and rival Shell could report record quarterly profits of about $6 billion each. The bumper figures come just as diesel is expected to hit £1 a litre for the first time tomorrow.
THE ARTICLE
July 23, 2006
By Tracey Boles
A LEADING shareholder in BP is calling for the company to lift its mandatory retirement age of 60 so that chief executive Lord Browne can stay on at the oil giant.
Co-operative Insurance Society (CIS), which owns 1% of BP, intends to raise the matter at next year’s annual meeting if informal talks in the next few months do not yield the results it wants.
Ian Jones, CIS’s head of corporate governance, said: “We want the compulsory retirement age removed. To forcibly retire is not necessarily in shareholder interests. We would be unhappy about Browne’s retirement being forced in that way.”
Under BP’s rules, Browne must retire as chief executive in February 2008 when he turns 60. The succession issue has already come under the spotlight after Browne said he hoped to play a key role in choosing his replacement.
Morley Fund Management — a top 10 investor in BP with a 2% holding — said that it wanted to see a “well-managed succession process”.
Browne is widely seen as having led BP through the most successful decade in its history. But a source close to the company said: “I don’t think Browne’s departure is a matter of mandatory retirement age. Twelve years is long enough for any chief executive.”
BP declined to comment. The company favours appointing a new chief executive from within the company. The candidates are thought to be Tony Hayward, head of exploration and production, John Manzoni, who heads refining and marketing, and Iain Conn, group executive director.
One shareholder said that appointing Browne’s successor would be arguably the single most difficult decision the board had to make. Several others said they were happy with the way BP was conducting the process.
Martin Cawthorne, a fund manager at Morley, said: “Morley’s focus is succession planning and, as for any company with a successful chief executive approaching retirement age, Morley calls for an effective and well-managed process.
“Given that there is almost two years to develop an effective and well-managed succession plan at BP, Morley has every reason to believe the BP board will manage this process well.”
This week BP and rival Shell could report record quarterly profits of about $6 billion each. The bumper figures come just as diesel is expected to hit £1 a litre for the first time tomorrow.
Meanwhile, British Gas is set to post a record loss of up to £150m for the first six months of the year, putting pressure on its parent Centrica to raise household energy bills again. Analysts predict another rise in bills at British Gas late in the summer.
The record loss, topping the £75m loss posted by British Gas in the second half of last year, has occurred because soaring wholesale gas prices have not been fully offset by rises in the prices it charges consumers.
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
