Guinness Peat Group taps new chairman

Rob Campbell has been tapped to chair Guinness Peat Group after change-manager Mark Johnson stepped down last week.

Campbell, whose appointment comes into effect immediately, will oversee the investment company's capital return to investors, and the board has decided against searching for an external senior executive to manage the wind-down.

Johnson isn't seeking re-election at the company's annual meeting in June, and the board wants to replace him with an Australian-based independent director.

The boardroom shuffle comes after Gary Weiss said he's quitting GPG at the end of April, staying on as chairman of Coats Plc for at least 12 months and offering consulting services as the investment group founded by Ron Brierley winds itself down.

That leaves Bake Nixon as the last of Brierley's long-serving lieutenants on the board, after Brierley stepped down as chairman in December last year amid a shareholder revolt over a proposed restructure that would have carved up the empire along regional lines.

A boardroom kerfuffle ensued, and New Zealand director Tony Gibbs was forced out after he publicly opposed the bid.

The New Zealand office was subsequently shut, though Gibbs kept his chairing roles at GPG's part-owned Tower and Turners & Growers.

The shareholder opposition was successful in halting the bid, and independent directors, which now control GPG, were installed to oversee a new strategy.

Shareholders will get to vote at this year's AGM on whether to accept a capital return of $158 million via a scheme of arrangement under which they will get a cash payment in return for the cancellation of a proportion of their shares. The deal needs approval from UK Court and tax authorities.

Former chairman and founder Brierley had promised a substantial capital return as far back as 2008, when he first flagged his retirement, though the global financial crisis put the kybosh on those plans.

GPG's shares were unchanged at 78.5 cents in trading yesterday, and have climbed 8.3 per cent this year, outperforming the NZX 50 index's 4.3 per cent rise.