Arla Elected representatives meeting is set to be lively

Arla's first 2018 UKAF Area Forum to be held at Meriden, nr Coventry, this coming  Thursday 11th is set to be a lively meeting and will certainly  challenge meeting Chairmanship skills of  John Cook.  A second forum will be held on Thursday 8th February.

As a forerunner last week’s BOR meeting in London flushed out Ake Hantoft who flew over to support Johnnie Russel and those who took the decision to axe Jonathan Ovens business D. Mortimer as an Arla member.

It has now come to lights that both Russel and Hantoft during 2017 both independently asked Ovens face to face to resign and having failed then proceeded to rescind the membership as has already been well documented.

The surprise to several at last week’s BOR meeting was that when questioned Hantoft evidently pointed the finger at Ovens involvement in retail PO’s as the reason he was ousted which is either a U turn or a curve ball to the HMRC issues previously suggested as the reason for Ovens execution.  It’s certainly far from clear as to the exact reason(S) behind his departure.

It’s a crying shame that Amirahmadi and the Arla Commercial Team are succeeding against fierce competition (see Aldi story above) but at farm level there is top table infighting and jostling for position which is almost certain to cost Arla reputationally especially if Ovens gets the bit between his teeth and this goes legal.

The expectation is that this week’s elected representatives meeting will be an opportunity for the executioners to re communicate Ovens guilt without declaring to those present the legal basis for his crime and punishment. That’s the point at which the temperature in the room will rise.

Some claim they will be demanding details as to why Ovens membership was rescinded and exactly what crime(s) he has committed. There goal is  to satisfy themselves whether it was a kangaroo court and whether the punishment fits the crime and that the process used fully complies with Arla’s Corporate & Social Responsibility Standards , The rules of UK Arla Farmers Co operative  as well as  EU  and UK law.

The likelihood of this weeks meeting seeing high level delegates attend without prior notice from Denmark and the finance team is a near certainty. Post the meeting the matter is highly unlikely to fade away.