By Geoff Senescall
The company housing Brierley's airline shares has yet to sanction the investment group's flight overseas.
This was confirmed by Bill Wilson, QC, who is the chairman of BIL NZ Assets -the company set up to enable Brierley to get around foreign ownership restrictions on its Air New Zealand shareholding.
BIL NZ Assets is critical to any migration overseas because it holds the voting rights of Brierley's 172 million Air New Zealand A shares, which account for the bulk of its 47 per cent holding.
If BIL NZ Assets senses there is an issue with the move the board can vote those shares how it likes. Air New Zealand's annual meeting later this month will be an interesting test of where it stands.
Mr Wilson, who has just returned from Britain, said the board of BIL NZ Assets was in the process of considering the implications of Brierley's plan to move its incorporation to Bermuda by the end of this year.
"There is a very real issue as to how to ensure that any consequences of the Brierley move are taken into account," he said yesterday The board needed to ensure that Air New Zealand's position was fully protected. While the chairman of Brierley and Air New Zealand, Sir Selwyn Cushing, has said the way is clear, concern has been raised that Brierley's departure may jeopardise the airline's international landing-rights agreements with other countries.
Brierley - which also holds 95 million of the unrestricted Air New Zealand B shares - was forced to set up BIL NZ Assets in 1996 to get around the fact that 70 per cent of its shareholders were based overseas.
But at that time Brierley was managed and controlled in New Zealand and most of its directors and senior management were New Zealanders based in Wellington.
After the upheaval on the board last year, only two of the six board members can be classed as New Zealanders.
The BIL NZ Assets board must now decide if the shift in character at Brierley could leave Air New Zealand vulnerable to any attack from the likes its arch competitor Qantas.
BIL NZ Assets' other independent board members are Peter Shirtcliffe and Sir Ron Trotter. Mark Horton, the fourth member, represents Brierley.
Brierley flight waits on airline all-clear
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.