SYDNEY (Reuters) – Woodside Energy Group Ltd’s shareholders on Friday supported its management pay report and re-election of directors despite a push by activist groups and some smaller investors upset over its climate report to reject the plans.
The management pay report was approved by more that 79% of the shareholders while about 21% voted against it, according to provisional results released during its annual general meeting.
Under Australian rules, a remuneration report will not be adopted if it is rejected by more than a quarter of shareholders.
Three of the directors on Woodside’s sustainability committee – former Australian resources minister Ian Macfarlane, former Shell Singapore chairperson Swee Chen Goh, and former ConocoPhillips senior executive Larry Archibald were re-elected.
They had been particular targets of activists and proxy advisers seeking to protest against the company’s climate report. Proxy adviser Glass Lewis had opposed the 2022 report, saying it was concerned by Woodside’s dependence on carbon offsets instead of operational changes to meet emissions reduction targets.
Nearly 35% of the shareholders voted against re-electing Macfarlane, but over 50% is required for a director to be voted out. Two other Woodside directors, Arnaud Breuillac and Angela Minas, who are not on the sustainability committee faced little opposition to their re-elections.
Some investors had wanted Australia’s biggest independent oil and gas producer to publish a comprehensive climate strategy after its 2022 plan released in February closely resembled its 2021 plan. Woodside has said it intends to put its climate report to a non-binding, advisory vote at its annual meeting in 2024.
(Reporting by Harish Sridharan and Lewis Jackson; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Jamie Freed)
