Shares in the firm also plunged after Britain voted to leave the European Union, dragged down by the collapse in the value of the pound against the dollar and the fact Sports Direct had not hedged its currency for such an outcome.
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There was speculation in the wake of the report that majority shareholder and founder Mike Ashley could launch a bid to take the company private and the quashing of this rumour explains some of the share price fall.
He said: “Unite still has concerns over the use of the two employment agencies – The Best Connection and Transline, which supply over 3,400 workers to the Sports Direct Shirebrook warehouse”.
Legal & General Investment Management said following the vote that Hellawell should step down “immediately”.
Work is due to start soon on a new Sports Direct in Belfast city centre, nearly a year after the company bought Donegall Arcade, where the new store will be located.
But the chairman’s position was safeguarded after Mr Ashley – the Newcastle United owner who owns 55% of Sports Direct – backed him.
INDEPENDENT shareholders have vented their anger at under-fire Sports Direct chairman Keith Hallawell, with 53 per cent voting against his reappointment.
The animated meeting saw shareholders at one point corner Mr Ashley.
After an early skirmish with a Unite representative, Mr Ashley appeared genuinely repentant, not avoiding any hard questions from the press, and promising that conditions would improve.
“While the report marks significant progress, not least the eradication of zero hour contracts in the stores and the six strikes and you are out system, Unite will be asking the board to go further and faster in a number areas when we engage with the [organisation]”.
Yesterday Sports Direct announced that it would give all retail staff a guaranteed 12 hours’ work per week, but this would not apply to agency employees, which make up 94 per cent of staff at the much criticised Shirebrook plant.
He called for a “full and independent review of governance at the company” and a commitment to act on it in the next twelve months.
Mr Hellawell, a former chief constable of West Yorkshire Police and who will have been particularly embarrassed by the recent revelation that Sports Direct had been breaking the law by not paying some workers the national minimum wage, is still likely to be on his way eventually.
But Sports Direct said in a statement: “Dr Hellawell offered to step down over the weekend in the light of the shortcomings highlighted in the report, but he will stay in his role to assist with making further improvements”.
In another blow for Mr Ashley, Legal & General, the retailer’s 11th largest shareholder, has said it intends to vote against the re-election of chairman Keith Hellawell and all non-executive directors, while also supporting the “shareholder requisition resolution on an independent review of labour practices”.
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“In order for the company’s equity value to reflect its potential, we encourage the board to bold action”, Standard Life said.
