{"id":48974,"date":"2026-05-26T11:26:34","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T11:26:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/48974\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T11:26:34","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T11:26:34","slug":"protesters-halt-natwest-shareholder-meeting-as-boss-defends-climate-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/48974\/","title":{"rendered":"Protesters halt NatWest shareholder meeting as boss defends climate policy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Protesters Protesters have forced NatWest to halt its shareholder meeting (Mike Egerton\/PA) (PA Archive) <\/p>\n

Protesters<\/a> have forced NatWest<\/a> to halt its shareholder meeting, as the bank\u2019s chairman defended its climate policy in response to investors claiming it has \u201cbacktracked\u201d on commitments.<\/p>\n

The annual general meeting (AGM) was being held on Tuesday morning but had to be stopped for about half an hour amid disruption during chairman Rick Haythornthwaite\u2019s opening speech.<\/p>\n

Protesters were singing and making statements about NatWest\u2019s climate policies.<\/p>\n

The boss heard a statement presented by ShareAction<\/a>, backed by investors managing 1.4 trillion US dollars (\u00a31 trillion) in assets, including the Church of England Pensions Board, Greater Manchester Pension Fund and Rathbones Investment Management.<\/p>\n

The statement said investors are \u201cconcerned by the bank\u2019s changed outlook on climate change\u201d having \u201creduced the ambition of its fossil fuel policy and climate targets\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bank dropped its commitment not to finance oil and gas majors lacking a credible transition plan or failing to report their overall emissions,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

It called for Mr Haythornthwaite to meet the group of shareholders to discuss the bank\u2019s climate strategy.<\/p>\n

Campaigners including ShareAction are also calling for shareholders to vote against the re-election of the bank\u2019s chair over concerns of climate backtracking, which the Church of England\u2019s pensions body said it plans to do.<\/p>\n

The results of the poll, shared after the AGM<\/a>, showed that about 92% of votes were cast in favour of Mr Haythornthwaite\u2019s re-election, leaving almost 8% that were cast against.<\/p>\n

Jeanne Martin, head of banking\u00a0programmes\u00a0at\u00a0ShareAction, said it showed a \u201csignificant level of dissent in a system where board chairs are normally waived through with overwhelming support\u201d.<\/p>\n

She added that the vote should be seen as a \u201cclear warning that confidence is already being eroded, and that further backtracking will carry real governance consequences\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Haythornthwaite responded to the statements saying that he \u201ctakes climate change very seriously, as does all of this board\u201d and that he was happy to meet the group.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve had to wrestle with the questions of how do we balance supporting our customers in their transition efforts with managing the risks in what is an increasingly complex policy environment,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He stressed that the bank\u2019s \u201coverwhelming\u201d balance of lending was on renewables and that oil and gas financing comprises 0.6% of total lending.<\/p>\n

NatWest also retained targets to at least halve the climate impact of its financing activity by 2030, against a 2019 baseline.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to take what sounds like a backtracking as a major shift,\u201d Mr Haythornthwaite said, adding that \u201cthese targets matter\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Protesters have forced NatWest to halt its shareholder meeting (Mike Egerton\/PA) (PA Archive) Protesters have forced NatWest to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[21386],"tags":[21374,602,24614,24615,24616,7955,7844,23597],"class_list":["post-48974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-natwest","tag-annual-general-meeting","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-policies","tag-climate-policy","tag-greater-manchester-pension-fund","tag-natwest","tag-protesters","tag-rick-haythornthwaite"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116640637442689607","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}