Vote expected on Richie Boucher remuneration

A vote on the remuneration package for Bank of Ireland chief Richie Boucher will take place this evening at the bank’s AGM.
Mr Boucher was paid more than 840-thousand euro last year, despite the bank suffering losses of more than 2 billion.
In the Dail earlier the Taoiseach said he expects bank chiefs to take a significant cut when they respond to government calls on them to reduce their cost base by between 6 and 10 percent.
However Finance Minister Michael Noonan is to abstain from voting on Mr. Boucher’s pay package at today’s Annual General Meeting.
Our Business Editor Ian Guider is at the AGM and says there is intense anger on the issue among the smaller shareholders.
“The small shareholders, they don’t have as much a say as the big pension funds of these big investors – and even the government’s 15 percent stake wouldn’t be enough to block Richie Boucher” he said.
“It would also cause a row with the bank – they have supported them through and through the last couple of years, so they’re not going to give them a bloody nose over this”.
“It was just a needless row; and you kind of wonder – the shareholders here – are they just being led around the garden path here because the bank already has the votes in, they know exactly how it’s going to go” he added.