Government to review and demand sex quotas

While we are pleased to note that a government review is likely to reject calls for quotas to promote female representation on company boards we are worried that the 'review' will nevertheless 'demand' that FTSE100 companies set clear target and will also threaten more draconian measures if no action is taken. This news raises a number of interesting questions - about corporate governance but above all about democracy and due legal process. Who is in charge of such a 'review' in the first place? What democratic mandate does an appointee (inevitable a Lord suchandsuch) have? What prevents him to simply put his personal bias into a 'review'? How can it be right that a Government can simply 'demand' that its citizens behave in a certain way without having this 'demand' legitimised in democratic fashion? Why should special laws exist for FTSE100 companies and not for all the other thousands of listed or private companies (some of them are larger than their FTSE100 brethren)? And why is the group of citizens most affected by these politically-inspired machinations - all the investor-citizens who risk their capital in order to finance businesses - and their 'fiduciaries' (the major fund management and investment companies) so quiet when it comes to defend its interests? As long as the democratic system is dysfunctional it lends itself to abuse by narrow 'elites' and unaccountable lobbies. But until democratic reforms are achieved the least one would expect is that share owners and business put up a proper fight and stand up for their rights. The very minimum would be a judicial review as arbitrary and discriminatory quotas are an affront to the human rights so many activists are claiming to speak for at present.
(13/02/2011)