AGM 2023
Our Annual General Meeting (AGM) is being held on Tuesday, 25 April 2023 at 4.00pm at our Head Office, Emlyn Hughes House, Abbey Road, Barrow in Furness, Cumbria LA14 5PQ.
Please take the time to look at the information contained in your voting pack. You will find the Notice of AGM, and who you are voting for in the Summary Financial Statement. The Members’ Review provides an update on how we continue to provide for our customers and communities.
You can vote online here, by post, at the Meeting or at a branch. To guarantee we receive your vote, the online facility is the quickest and easiest to use. For every vote received, we’ll donate £1 to Barrow Food Bank.
I’d like to thank you for your continued support and commitment as a valued Member.
Ready to vote now? You'll need the two-part security code included in your voting pack.
Our Annual General Meeting (AGM) was held on Tuesday 25 April 2023.
The Votings Results are below and the minutes of the 2022 AGM were signed off.
Our People
At the AGM we shared a short video to show how we adapted to continue to support our people, our customers, colleagues and our communities.
Voting Results
| Resolution | Description | For | Against | Withheld |
| 1 | To receive Annual Report & Accounts | 3907 | 44 | 34 |
| 2 | To approve the Directors' Remuneration Report | 3517 | 379 | 82 |
| 3 | To re-appoint Mazars LLP as Auditors | 3804 | 120 | 55 |
| 4 | To re-elect Graham Michael Berville as a Director | 3756 | 164 | 67 |
| 5 | To re-elect Christopher Michael Harrison as a Director | 3753 | 166 | 65 |
| 6 | To re-elect Kim Louise Rebecchi as a Director | 3749 | 191 | 56 |
| 7 | To re-elect Nicholas John Gower as a Director | 3751 | 165 | 65 |
| 8 | To re-elect Phillip Alexander McLelland as a Director | 3739 | 181 | 64 |
| 9 | To re-elect Andrew Paul Haywood as a Director | 3720 | 194 | 67 |
| 10 | To re-elect Peter David Rogerson as a Director | 3722 | 195 | 66 |
| 11 | To elect Laura Hamp as a Director | 3812 | 121 | 54 |
2021 AGM - Questions and answers
Your staff in Barrow are redirecting FBS members to other establishments, so FBS staff don’t have to handle money. However banks and other building societies are able to offer this service, why?
To ensure that we keep our customers and our staff safe, and fully adhere to government guidelines around social distancing during the Covid-19 pandemic, the services that our branches are able to provide has been limited in order to reduce the amount of face-to-face contact our staff and other customers may be exposed to.
Why use pale and small text in places?
We have worked with a professional design agency to produce the booklet – however we accept the point and we will try to ensure the readability of all sections of the booklet going forward.
Why does the CEO earn more than the Prime Minister and are the NED fees excessive?
We operate in a highly regulated and competitive market and require a high calibre skilled and qualified experienced leadership team to support and achieve our corporate objectives.
When recruiting for senior leadership, including the CEO, we carry out a formal Executive benchmarking process, using an external independent third party which takes into consideration other similar sized Building Society’s pay and reward systems and external market data comparisons. This is to ensure we can recommend fair remuneration packages to our Remuneration Committee which are supported with reliable and factual data.
We must continue to attract, recruit and retain key leadership capability and we align our remuneration packages with the external market, whilst ensuring our pay and reward policy is within affordable limits. We also continue to receive Executive remuneration data from our industry body (the Building Societies Association) on an annual basis. This is to ensure that we are able to fairly compare our remuneration packages against the sector. Please be assured that our remuneration packages across all Executives, including the CEO, are fair and commensurate with their skills and accountabilities.
Similarly, we undertake an annual review of Non-Executive Director fees and use sector benchmarking and comparable external market remuneration data to ensure our fees are fair and consistent. Regulation across the financial services sector has and continues to increase considerably. We need to be able to attract credible Directors with sound specialist knowledge to balance the skills of your Board and enhance the leadership capability.
The attendance of our Non-Executive’s at formal Board and Committee meetings is at least 2 days per month. Additionally, NED’s spend a number of days per month, reading, preparing, training and also supporting our Executive colleagues.
Why does the design concept of the members review include so many positive images? – seems out of touch with current circumstances.
We collaborated with a professional design agency to produce a booklet which reflected our membership population, and we were conscious of the overall tone under the current circumstances.
Will you issue a loyalty bond and not put all the services online as some older customers do not like using technology.
We are constantly open to ways in which we can reward our longer term members and from time to time do offer ‘loyalty’ products. Although we have no plans to launch a loyalty product in the very near future, we continually review the position to balance value across the whole of our membership.
We have 9 branches across our network, which is centred in Barrow in Furness. We do offer an on-line channel which allows us to reach customers, who live outside our branch network area.
We know that many customers, across a wide age range, like to speak to a ‘real’ person but cannot call into one of our branches. They may live outside our branch network area or for many other reasons are unable to visit a branch. We are delighted to be able to offer the majority of our services via the telephone which combines a ‘real’ person service with convenience.
Will you issue a loyalty bond and not put all the services online as some older customers do not like using technology. Is there an action plan to improve diversity on the Board?
The Society has a Diversity policy and we ask our external recruitment agencies to focus on providing diverse candidate lists for consideration. We have improved our gender balance at the Board and in the Senior Leadership team, and we will continue to strive for high calibre individuals with the appropriate skills and experience from a diverse background in our Senior appointments. The gender balance of the Executive team is now split 50/50.
Are FBS Directors and staff included on the Board of Trustees? (and if so who are they?)
The Society is the Employer Sponsor, rather than Trustee, and we have very close engagement with the Trustees and Administrators in that capacity.
Please clarify the measures that the Board is taking to check that the newly appointed Entrust perform satisfactorily?
We have held regular meetings with the Trustee Board and Administrators throughout the handover and will continue to do so.
Members Review page 20 - Market Environment. The Review notes the prospect that base rates may become negative. What would be the consequences for FBS Savings?
If the base rate was set below 0%, then rates across the market could reduce for both savings and mortgages. FBS would set rates appropriately and in line with the market
Is there any possibility that FBS savings rates will become negative?
Whilst the impact of Covid-19 on life over the last 12 months has taught us that nothing can ever be guaranteed, we absolutely do not expect FBS savings rates to be negative.