Its board is made up of seven executives, four of which are non-executive board members.
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Last week it was reported that shareholders were staging a mutiny against the company’s chairman, Keith Hellawell. The sports goods retailer is also now under pressure after its founder and majority owner Mike Ashley told lawmakers in June that the firm had effectively paid staff at its Shirebrook warehouse below the statutory minimum wage by requiring them to queue for security checks on their own time. A rule change now means he needs investor support rather than the support of Mike Ashley, the company’s founder and largest shareholder.
Retailer Sports Direct has commissioned an independent report into its working conditions, which it will publish early next month.
Unite the union is also calling on shareholders to back a resolution at Sports Direct’s AGM for a seperate review into working practices at the firm.
The payment was agreed between the Unite union, the retailer and HM Revenue & Customs, and includes about 200 workers directly employed by Sports Direct and about 3,000 staff hired through temporary employment agencies. The move comes amid criticism over the group’s working practices at its main warehouse, as well as concerns over the company’s corporate governance. They also suffered deductions from their wage packets for clocking in for a shift a minute late.
Around 11.5pc of independent shareholders voted against the Sports Direct founder a year ago.
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Ashley claimed he was struggling to cope with the scale of Sports Direct when he appeared before MPs, and his board had been criticised for lacking independent directors.
