It is not surprising that the UK’s Co-operative Group appears “ungovernable” – the word used by outgoing CEO Euan Sutherland in his resignation letter. Co-operatives, with their political dimension, are likely to have more complex governance issues than public limited companies. The idea of hiring Mr Sutherland with his public limited company background (he was formerly chief operating officer at London-listed UK retailer Kingfisher) was to make it governable.
Mr Sutherland joined last May just after the deal for the Co-operative Bank to buy 631 Lloyds branches under 'project verde' fell apart. He only learned about this and the full extent of the bank’s £1.5bn ($2.49bn) black hole (mostly relating to bad loans that came with the 2009 purchase of Britannia Building Society) after he had agreed to take on the job.
