Without going into all the details of the unpleasant character
of the Report of the Shareholders' Committee of the Smithfield and Argentine Meat Company which was issued recently, there is one point which perhaps may be usefully emphasized. The Committee showed that over a period of four years the Directors and Managing Directors received a total of something over £100,000 by way of commission and salaries. One of the share- holders at the meeting held to consider the report not unnaturally expressed indignation at this disclosure, but the Chairman, or rather the Chairwoman (for it was a lady who was Chairman of the Committee of investigation), very truly remarked that in this respect the Directors were quite within the powers granted by the Articles of Association, which contained the common provision permitting Directors to appoint one or more of their Board as Directors or Managing Directors at a remuneration to be determined by the Board. Un- questionably this is a clause in Articles of Association which is open to great abuse, and is one to which excep- tion, if not invariably, might very often be taken by in- vestors in new companies. Unfortunately, however, the intending investor seldom troubles himself, or herself, even to read the Articles of Association.
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