C&W boss sparks shareholder revolt

Britain's largest shareholder group is urging its members to abstain from re-electing Graham Wallace, chief executive of Cable & Wireless.

The National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF), whose members control assets of £650bn, is unhappy with Mr Wallace's two-year contract that would net him at least £1.55m if he lost his job.

The group wants Mr Wallace to sign a more conventional one-year rolling contract and will register its protest at C&W's annual general meeting next month.

A spokesman for the NAPF said: "It's a point of principle. Why is Wallace on a two-year contract when most other C&W directors are on one?"

A spokesman for C&W said Mr Wallace joined the company before it introduced its policy of hiring directors on one-year contracts. "The board does not believe it is in shareholders' interests to renegotiate the contract."

The NAPF is also expected to raise concerns about two Cable & Wireless non-executive directors. The group believes that because Sir Win Bishchoff and Janet Morgan have had more than nine years on the board, they are not sufficiently independent.

At the AGM, shareholders will question Mr Wallace's focusing of C&W on its loss-making Global division.