End of shareholder revolt register ‘will help UK firms bury pay controversies’
UK-listed companies will be able to bury controversies over executive pay for the first time in eight years, a thinktank has warned, after the Labour government shut down a public tracker meant to curb “abuses and excess in the boardroom”.The public register was launched under the Tory prime minister Theresa May in 2017 to name and shame companies hit by shareholder revolts at their annual general meetings (AGMs).That included rebellions over issues such as excessive bonuses or salary increases for top earning bosses.However, the Treasury – under the chancellor, Rachel Reeves – instructed the Investment Association (IA), the UK asset management trade body that maintained the register, to shut it down this autumn as part of a wider regulation action plan to increase economic growth by cutting “red tape” for businesses.The closure of the public log follows lobbying campaign by companies including the London Stock Exchange, whose bosses claim bad publicity over executive pay is harming the City’s competitiveness and deterring UK listings.
However, the High Pay Centre, a thinktank, is warning the move will harm transparency and make it easier for companies listed on the FTSE All-Share Index to dismiss investors’ concerns, starting in the 2026 annual shareholder meetings season.“This is worrying, from our perspective,” Paddy Goffey, a researcher at the thinktank, said.“This would make it more likely that significant cases of shareholder dissent on issues of pay, governance and wider strategy will go unnoticed.”About 26% of FTSE 100 companies have had a shareholder rebellion against executive pay over the past three years.Dissent is considered a shareholder rebellion if 20% or more of the vote is against a specific resolution.
“This reflects the significant levels of dissent within shareholder votes and how crucial such information is for investors and other stakeholders,” Goffey said.The High Pay Centre acknowledged corporate reporting rules could be burdensome and complex, and should be streamlined.However, that should not include discontinuing tools such as the register that provided genuine value to stakeholders, the thinktank said.The closure added to other “worrying trends” around corporate transparency such as the shift to online-only AGMs.Rather than closing the register, companies should be forced to provide more detailed explanations about the reason for shareholder dissent and how their boards planned to respond in the future, the High Pay Centre said.
“Ultimately, discontinuing the register will make it much harder and more time-consuming to gather the relevant data and information, as such data could be ‘buried’ in complex filings, AGM results or lengthy reports,” it added.The decision illustrates the significant cultural shift that has taken place across the City since the May government launched the world’s first public log of dissenting shareholder votes in order to “restore public confidence in big business”.“It [the register] definitely had a role in holding companies to account in the early years, especially on remuneration, and for a while companies truly did worry about the prospect of being named on the register,” said Yousif Ebeed, the corporate governance lead at the assent managers Schroders.“And at the time, there was a sense that companies were not giving sufficient weight to shareholder concerns.The register helped shine a light on these companies, to an extent kickstarting an environment where transparency and shareholder engagement have become embedded practice.
”Fast forward to 2025, and City campaigners are raising fears that the UK is losing out on investment to the US, where Donald Trump has embarked on a “bonfire of regulation” in an attempt to lure money and business.The UK Treasury said in October tit was “grateful to the IA for establishing the register following a request from government” but that the public log had “served its purpose”.The Treasury added that the corporate governance code “already offered transparency for investors”.Ebeed said most institutional investors would remain “unaffected”.However, at a time when the government is pushing for more of the public to buy up UK shares, there is a fear that small retail investors could be left at a disadvantage.
“The reduction in transparency and knowledge on company practice could reduce the ability of investors to make informed decisions,” Goffey said.“Having all this data in one place also makes it easier to track discontent, identify trends and compare companies or sectors.It is plausible that, with the raising of the barrier to holding companies accountable in this way, they [companies] will be less likely to take such dissent seriously and respond appropriately.”
Unseen Tennessee Williams radio play published in literary magazine
As one of the 20th century’s most successful playwrights, Tennessee Williams penned popular works at the very pinnacle of US theater, including A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.Years before his almost unparalleled Broadway triumphs, however, the aspiring writer then known simply as Tom wrote a series of short radio plays as he struggled to find a breakthrough. One is The Strangers, a supernatural tale offering glimpses into the accomplished wordsmith that Williams would become, and published for the first time this week in the literary magazine Strand.It is a “significant find” according to scholars of Williams’s early days and upbringing in Missouri.“The play incorporates all the theatrical elements of early radio horror,” said Andrew Gulli, the publication’s managing editor
My cultural awakening: Love Actually taught me to leave my cheating partner
Emma Thompson’s quiet suffering in the hit Christmas movie helped me to realise that I didn’t need to stay with someone who had betrayed meI was 12 when Love Actually came out. In the eyes of my younger self it was a great film – vignettes of love I could only imagine one day feeling, all coloured by the fairy lights of Christmas. And there was even a cameo from Mr Bean himself, Rowan Atkinson. The film captured the romance I craved as a preteen, the idea that maybe a kid I fancied in my class would learn the drums for me and run through airport security to ask me out.I was young enough to think it was sweet for Keira Knightley’s husband’s best friend to turn up on her doorstep declaring his quite obviously unrequited love
The Guide #222: From Celebrity Traitors to The Brutalist via Bad Bunny – our roundup of the culture that mattered in 2025
It’s time to look back on a year of Traitors and Sinners, of Bad Bunnies and Such Brave Girls, with the Guide’s now annual roundup of the year’s best culture. As ever, the Guardian is already knee-deep in lists – of films (UK and US), albums (across rock and pop, and classical), TV shows, books and games, and theatre, comedy and dance. Some of those have already counted down to No 1, others will reach their respective summits in the coming days, so keep an eye on the homepage.Our list meanwhile is entirely, unapologetically partial, and definitely not as comprehensive as The Guardian’s many top 50s: there are numerous albums we never got around to hearing, and TV shows we’re still only halfway through. (Pluribus, Dope Thief and Blue Lights, I will return to you, I promise!) But hopefully it should give a flavour of a year that, despite so many headwinds, was a pretty strong one for culture
From Avatar to Amadeus: your complete entertainment guide to the week ahead
Avatar: Fire and AshOut now James Cameron comes down with a case of the Christmas blues, so to speak, as the director’s record-breaking franchise epic returns once more to planet Pandora for more internecine strife and respecting of the splendour of the natural world, rendered in dazzling motion-capture glory.Silent Night, Deadly NightOut now Actor Rohan Campbell graduates from Michael Myers wannabe in the fairly dire Halloween Ends, to main bogeyman Billy Chapman in the latest instalment of the Silent Night, Deadly Night franchise (second remake, seventh film overall, fact fans). Per franchise lore, he witnessed his parents’ murder-by-Santa aged five, and the rest is grisly history.Fackham HallOut now Jimmy Carr turns his hand to screenwriting with this parody of Downton Abbey-type films. Given the actual Downton Abbey films already play as a parody of Downtown Abbey-type films, there may not be much to add, but a cast including Thomasin McKenzie, Katherine Waterston, Damian Lewis and Anna Maxwell Martin are here to give it their best shot
Jimmy Kimmel on a tumultuous year: ‘Don’t know what the American way even is any more’
Late-night hosts reflected on a rollercoaster 2025 and Donald Trump’s combative, primetime year-end address to the nation.Jimmy Kimmel opened his final monologue of 2025 with an emotional reflection on a tumultuous year. “This has been a strange year. It’s been a hard year,” he said. “We’ve had some lows
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump’s speech: ‘Surprise primetime episode of The Worst Wing’
Late-night hosts discussed – or ignored – Donald Trump’s surprise primetime address and dug further into the explosive new interview the White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles.Jimmy Kimmel opened his Wednesday night show with an acknowledgment of the president’s 9pm ET national address, also known as a “surprise primetime episode of The Worst Wing tonight on every channel”.Trump announced only on Tuesday that he would deliver an impromptu fireside chat during the season finales of Survivor and The Floor. “It’s weird to think that had a couple of states just gone the other way, he’d be hosting one of those shows,” Kimmel joked. “Trump shouldn’t be pre-empting The Floor
Motor neurone disease patients in England die waiting for home adaptations, campaigners say
People in poorest areas of England ‘more likely to need emergency care for lung conditions’
Prosecutions for strangulation in England and Wales increase sixfold in three years
Britons reported to be drinking less, as data shows consumption at record low
Resident doctors say they will resume talks to avoid further strikes with ‘can-do spirit’
One in eight of 14- to 17-year-olds in Great Britain say they have used nicotine pouches