Now investors must speak up...

IT COULD be a bruising election for Jezza – and I don’t mean Corbyn. I am referring to Jes Staley, chief executive at Barclays, who has been embroiled in a whistleblower scandal and who is facing re-election by shareholders at the bank’s annual meeting this week.

There is almost zero chance that Staley will lose his post, but votes against the chief executive and even more abstentions are still likely to lead to an embarrassing result. A less than convincing victory for Staley will weaken any claim he may hope to have to be a strong and stable leader for Barclays. Staley’s mistake was in his handling of an anonymous whistleblower who alleged poor conduct somewhere in the bank (details remain private).

Staley set out to find the whistleblower’s identity, using Barclays’ security department. This is contrary to all decent boardroom practice and to any common sense reading of Barclays’ own code of conduct. It bears repeating that a facility for whistleblowing is an essential feature of even a half-well run company. Responsible bosses know that whistleblowers may be their best chance of being alerted to a problem. Whistleblowers themselves must feel confident they can report their concerns without fear of a witch-hunt.

The apparent merits or otherwise of a particular whistleblower’s claim are not relevant. What matters is a system that is abided by to the letter, so that if genuine misconduct does occur, whistleblowers can come forward. Following the litany of horrors that emerged from the world of finance during and since the crisis bankers above all should understand this logic.

Staley admitted his ‘errors’ last month. The Barclays board docked his bonus but said it believed he had made an ‘honest’ mistake. But even an honest mistake in this field is a very ill omen.

Staley has been punished internally and he may yet face censure from City watchdogs. Shareholders, who may have hoped Barclays was getting closer to shaking off its tarnished reputation, have also suffered. They also have a duty. After the financial crisis it was said, loudly, and quite correctly, that professional investors – notably the City institutions with the appropriate skills and resources – should have been taking a more active and responsible role in the bank they owned. Institutional shareholders have a duty to be responsible stewards of the companies in which they invest.

Shareholders in Barclays have an opportunity this week to show they remember that lesson in the way they cast their votes and the questions they ask.

It is an opportunity they must seize with both hands.