Shareholders vote in favour of Barclays' pay policies

Nearly all of Barclays' shareholders have voted in support of its pay package despite disgruntled investors airing concerns that the lender's misconduct issues were weighing on returns.

Some 97.5 per cent of all the votes cast at the bank's annual general meeting on Thursday were in favour of the directors' remuneration report.

Antony Jenkins, Barclay's chief executive, received £5.5m last year, including his first bonus of £1.1m.

One private shareholder lambasted Barclays' past misconduct, such as the alleged rigging of foreign exchange markets, for which he said shareholders had been paying the price.

"We seem to have lost our way with the board of directors - the bank has committed criminal and illegal acts around the world," he said.

Barclays is one of five banks expected to settle allegations that they manipulated the foreign exchange markets in an agreement with the US Department of Justice and several other regulators as soon as next month.

The shareholder's comments came after Mr Jenkins said the legacy issues "continue to cast a shadow" over the business.

"I expect we will make significant although sometimes difficult progress in this area in 2015," he said.

Another private shareholder raised the issue of 359 employees being paid more than £1m, even though Barclays posted a net loss of £174m last year.

"Only pay these sorts of salaries when performance justifies it," he said. "You can't pay anybody a salary of more than £1m when the performance of a bank is this poor."

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John McFarlane, the former chairman of Aviva, was set to take over from Sir David after Thursday's meeting. He has written to shareholders outlining his strategy, noting his top priorities.

These include the problem of legacy issues, tackling the underperformance of Barclays investment bank, shrinking its "bad bank" and boosting shareholder returns.

"While much has been done to clean up conduct issues from the past, some unfortunately still haunt us, causing substantial financial and remedial costs from several high-profile matters, originating in our retail and markets segments," he said.

One shareholder described Mr McFarlane at the meeting as a "thoroughly ruthless turnround specialist," asking the board whether it "can cope" with his arrival.

Another shareholder said: "I desperately hope he brings his chainsaw with him from Aviva."

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