The future of up to £1m of annual subscriptions to the Co-operative party is expected to be determined on Saturday when the result of a vote by more than 2 million members of the Co-operative Group is due to be revealed.
The vote on political donations to the party, which is aligned with Labour and whose highest-profile MP was Ed Balls until he lost his seat on 7 May, is just one of the issues to be voted on at the Co-op Group’s annual meeting in Manchester.
About 800 members have registered to attend the meeting, the first since the introduction of a new one-member one-vote system, which replaces the previous method where block votes were cast by about 100 attendees.
Votes have been cast by up to 2.7 million members out of an estimated 7 million on a range of topics that include directors’ pay and the group’s continued approach to stocking fair trade products.
At last year’s meeting, members voted through a series of corporate reforms after the record £2.5bn loss in 2014, caused by a scandal in its banking arm and overexpansion by its supermarkets.
However, this year’s meeting has been the subject of rows with longstanding co-op activists who are concerned about the way three member-nominated directors for the board have been selected.
Midcounties, the largest of the independent societies which together own 22% of the group, has been considering taking out an injunction after the group cut a shortlist of six down to three, for the three seats, meaning there would be no contested election.
The offer of arbitration by Co-op chairman Allan Leighton, who was appointed in February, may have deflected any legal action. There is also a possibility that the member-nominated directors could rise to four.
