100 signatures reached
To: The board of Nationwide Building Society
Reject bonuses and obscene executive pay at Nationwide Building Society
Dear members of the board,
This year your CEO was paid £2.26m, the equivalent of 190 minimum wages, and that could rise to £2.9m next year. Another four executive directors received an average of £1.4m each. By adopting the perverse bonus culture and self-serving pay practices of the banking sector, you validate them through their association with more socially conscious mutuals.
We members and non-members alike call on you to recognise the special role of mutuals in providing an alternative to banking's profit-at-all-costs mentality by eliminating bonuses and reining in levels of executive pay within your institution. Think instead about how money saved on pay could be invested to "support the community" and "give value and fairness" in line with your stated principles.
Why is this important?
By acting like a bank, you forget your unique role in the financial sector at the time when you should be most mindful of it. As your website points out, “Nationwide has mutual status, which means that we are owned by and run for the benefit of our members”, rather than for profit. Mutuals and co-ops should be keeping the banks honest, showing them that social justice and financial stability go hand in hand. If the ethical alternative to big banks is paying its CEO 190 times the minimum wage, then what hope is there for reform of the rest?
[See the campaign website link on the left for a fuller explanation]
