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Shareholder alarm over appointment of BG Group CEO Chris Finlayson

Can BG Group shareholders and employees place their trust in the newly appointed Chief Executive, Chris Finlayson? Unfortunately the answer is NO. In the next few days we will publish confidential Shell internal documents, leaked information, court documents and video evidence to support this conclusion. Mr Finlayson has been involved in multiple cover-ups at his previous employer Shell, costing Shell shareholders billions of dollars, with huge consequential damage to its reputation.

By John Donovan

Last Wednesday we published an article about the newly appointed Chief Executive of BG Group, Chris Finlayson under the headline: Finlayson is no Chapman

It concerned his role in a “Touch F*** All” safety culture on Shell North Sea platforms and the related cover-up.

The Independent picked up the story and published an article on their website and in newspapers in the UK and Australia: BG’s new chief ‘breached safety rules when at Shell’

That in turn triggered a related conversation on the interactive investor website discussion forum on the BG Group (discussion reproduced below) under the topic: “New Man Looking Bad Appointment.”

I have rarely read so much ill-informed piffle in response to legitimate anxiety expressed by a shareholder. 

Can BG Group shareholders and employees place their trust in the newly appointed Chief Executive, Chris Finlayson? Unfortunately the answer is NO. 

In the next few days we will publish confidential Shell internal documents, leaked documents, court documents and video evidence to support this conclusion. Mr Finlayson has been involved in multiple cover-ups at his previous employer Shell, costing Shell shareholders billions of dollars, with huge consequential damage to its reputation. 

The evidence also covers his time in the projects mentioned by “LK Hyman” in the discussion below.

Discussion on interactive investor BG Group page Friday 14 December 2012

Fri 08:25 New Man Looking Bad Appointment? User Name Spain Fund

Raised as a question but has BG failed AGAIN.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/bgs-new-boss-breached-safety-rules-at-shell-in-the-north-sea-8413715.html?origin=internalSearch

I’m a share holder but …..

14:33 Re Dividends User Name Broncomaniac

LKH, do you know much of this Finlayson fellow? Did your paths ever cross at Shell?

REPLY BY LK Hyman Fri 12:58

Bronco,

No, I never met him, but he reportedly did two huge jobs extremely succssfully, Nigerian LNG and the Sakhalin 2 project. You’ve got to take your hat off to anyone who can manage those two projects to a successful conclusion.

The fact that he was the unanimous choice over the external and the other two internal candidates, the Brazilian bean counter (though the fact that he has been unwell may have ruled him out from the get go) and Martin Houston suggests that he is head and shoulders better than the others.

I wouldn’t attach much credence to his supposed involvement with the alleged “Touch F*** All” maintenance policy in the North Sea. Even if true (and I very much doubt that it is) the experience will probably have made him determined to avoid a second accusation of being cavalier with safety. As a general rule Shell has a far better reputation as regards safety than almost any other big operator.

LKH on the flybridge

http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/detail/?display=discussion&code=cotn%3ABG-.L&it=le

UPDATE

I note that as of 16.34 Sunday, there is already mention of this article on the above BG Group discussion forum with a link to this article…

With regard to the comment about Shell’s “far better reputation as regards safety”, this article is worth reading: Royal Dutch Shell Safety Concerns

In advance of publishing the pending article, it is our intention to supply BG Group with a copy of it and full sight of all of the evidence referred to above. This will give the company the opportunity to seek an injunction to prevent publication if they challenge the veracity of what we say or the authenticity of the evidence. 

FURTHER UPDATE

Further posting on Interactive Investor BG Group discussion forum by LK Hyman

The Donovans and their royaldutchshell website are well known anti-Shell grouchs. They’ve had it in for Shell for years, as a result of their perception that Shell gypped them somehow or other over a sales promotion scheme that they sold to Shell in the dim and distant past. I have no idea whether Shell did or not but, one way or t’other, Shell has disrespected them, and they’re determined to get their own back, big time.

There’s little doubt that Shell would have done well to have settled with them amicably years ago, because their website has done Shell a lot of harm over the years, and has attracted traffic from Shell insiders, some of whom are, for one reason or another, disaffected themselves, as is always the case with large companies. Those who are happy with and loyal to their company rarely appear on such websites.

Whatever, I’d take whatever they say about Chris Finlayson with a giant pinch of salt.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the negativity that they’re spreading about him doesn’t feed back to some further decline in the BG share price if the recent few days’ falls are in any way related to his appointment, though I stand by my previous posts. Finlayson looks like an excellent choice for BG CEO to me, but I never met him, and it’s quite possible that he made a lot of enemies, as those who get to the top of the greasy pole usually do.

All in all I’d ignore that story unless some skeleton comes tumbling out of the woodwork. It’ll be interesting to see what they come up with.

LKH on the flybridge

ENDS

Comment by John Donovan

We found it necessary to issue six high court actions against Shell, four for theft of ideas disclosed in strictest confidence. Two for libel. One County Court case claiming breach of contract. All cases were settled by Shell.

The last proceedings were actually brought by Shell against us in 2005 in an attempt to seize our domain name royaldutchshellplc.com. Shell had an army of several hundred lawyers, we had none. Shell lost that case as well.

Shell subsequently decided that it will never sue us again. Too much “internal laundry” in our possession. This information comes from Shell internal communications in our possession.

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.

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