EasyJet chairman Sir Mike Rake today accused founder and major shareholder Sir Stelios Haji-Iaonnou of running a campaign involving "inappropriate and defamatory" attacks on the airline's executives.
Sir Stelios owns a 38% stake in the group and has repeatedly condemned the company for the way it calculates bonuses for its bosses including chief executive Carolyn McCall.
He claims the use of return on capital employed to measure the directors' performance falsely inflates the airline's performance. Methodologies for measuring ROCE are contentious among analysts.
Sir Stelios also claims it is inappropriate for 5% shareholder Standard Life to be able to vote on the company's strategy when it makes millions of pounds a year running the pension scheme of easyJet's plane supplier, Airbus.
However, chairman Sir Mike Rake today told investors at the airline's AGM in Luton: "We have consistently refused to enter into this debate in public and have repeatedly encouraged Stelios to meet with us to discuss any issues that he might have. This, apart from one brief meeting... he has refused to do."
In a blow-by-blow rebuttal of Sir Stelios' accusations, Sir Mike: denied the claim that easyJet had overpaid for its new Airbus planes;
said his demand for a £600 million special dividend was unreasonable in the current economic climate, pointing out Thomas Cook's recent travails were partly due to an excessive dividend;
refuted Sir Stelios's condemnation of the issuance of £160 million of new shares by claiming nearly 75% of them were approved by him before he left
the board; said the board would review the management's bonus targets.
