CalPERS Asks U.S. Senate Committee to Protect Proxy Access

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) has asked the U.S. Senate Banking Committee to urge federal regulators to leave intact a court decision giving the company’s owners the right to access its ballots to seek approval of director election procedures.

Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox has said he wishes to move forward by asking an incomplete Commissioner’s panel to approve a proposal nullifying the court ruling and precluding shareowners from brining shareowner proposals that would allow them to nominate directors through proxy ballots.  The proposed rule change would eliminate the proxy access rights for the 2008 season.

“This ill-timed proposal before a sub-set of the Commission is unfair, unwise, violates the core principle of ‘do no harm’ to shareowners, and is contrary to the very purpose for which the SEC was established,” Dennis Johnson, Senior Portfolio Manager of CalPERS’ Corporate Governance, said at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs.  “The Commission should stand for more corporate democracy, not less democracy.  For all the sophistication of our markets in the U.S., we continue to lag other countries incorporate democracy.”