By Paddy Briggs
Sunday May 11 2008
News in The Observer, May 11 2008, that Royal Dutch Shell is to pay £3m ($6 billion) to directors simply to stay on the board for three years will be met with strong criticism not only by the investor community but also by one of Shells forgotten set of stakeholders – their Pensioners in the UK. Many of Shells 30,000 plus Pensioners live on monthly stipends of well below the British minimum wage and a proportion of these, perhaps as many as 5000 in number, receive £5000 ($10,000) per annum or less. These lowly paid Pensioners, most of whom worked for Shell for 30 years or more and are now in their late 70s, 80s or older, received a paltry 4% increase in their pensions in a recent review. Shell Pensioners made a persuasive case to Shell earlier this year saying that a rise in line with the Retail Price Index (4%) would not address the needs of the majority of our pensioner population in terms of protection from real cost inflation. They argued that a discretionary increase above RPI was warranted and pointed out that such increases were permitted by the regulations of the Shell Pension Fund – and had happened in the past. Shell rejected this request out of hand.
Sources close to the Shell pensioner community report that many Shell pensioners are incensed by the fact that not only are the remuneration packages of Shells board members well into seven figures but that special arrangements have been made and funded by Shell to ensure that directors pensions when they retire will be well into seven figures as well. These sources say that Shell seems very willing to ensure that its top executives maintain their high-living lifestyles when they retire, whilst turning a blind eye to the thousands of their ex-employees who live in less comfortable circumstances. The news about the golden handcuffs has fueled the fire of this discontent.
Observer Article…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/may/11/oil.royaldutchshell1
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.
