By: The Guardian
March 18, 2021
The government plans to make it easier to claw back bonuses paid to executives of failed companies in what is being billed as the biggest shake-up of Britain’s corporate governance rules in decades, with ministers vowing to target negligent auditors and rogue directors.
Part of a sweeping series of reforms designed to break the dominance of the big four accounting firms, the new measures were outlined by the business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng in a consultation launched on Thursday.
If adopted the changes would represent the culmination of years scrutiny of the UK’s rules on financial reporting and corporate governance after the failures of BHS, the department store sold off by Sir Philip Green, outsourced services company Carillion, and Thomas Cook, the tour operator that collapsed after 178 years in business.