Another insurance body cuts ties with CBI

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI), “abhorrent” allegations against which include two rape claims, has lost another member – this time it’s the turn of the Association of Medical Insurers and Intermediaries (amii) to cut ties with the scandal-hit organisation.

“We are deeply concerned about the allegations made about the CBI and have therefore decided to terminate our membership with immediate effect,” said amii executive chair Dave Middleton (pictured) in a statement sent to Insurance Business.

“In light of this, amii cannot continue to support the CBI, and we have notified the organisation of our immediate termination accordingly.”

President’s open letter

On Monday, CBI president Brian McBride addressed members in an open letter.

“I wanted to talk to each of you directly and openly about the crisis that has engulfed the CBI,” wrote McBride. “About how this organisation, for almost 60 years an active and proud champion of British industry, let down its own people, and deservedly lost your trust in consequence. And about what steps we are taking to give you reason to consider trusting us again.

“Whether that is possible, I simply don’t know. That is, of course, for each of you to decide. Whichever decision you each make, I believe that it is still necessary and valuable to share directly with you, our members, and to industry as a whole, all that we have learned about what went wrong in our organisation, and what we could have better done to prevent these terrible incidents from ever having taken place.”

The findings, according to the CBI, are based both on its own analysis and on the independent investigations conducted by law firm Fox Williams on the allegations raised by The Guardian.

Citing a collective sense of shame among the CBI board and leadership, McBride acknowledged the organisation’s shortcomings.

“In retrospect, we now know that we were complacent,” said the president, who described the allegations as abhorrent. “And we made mistakes in how we organised the business that led to terrible consequences… We didn’t put in place sufficient preventative measures to protect our people from those seeking to cause harm, and we didn’t react properly when issues arose as a result.

“We failed to filter out culturally toxic people during the hiring process. We failed to conduct proper cultural onboarding of staff. Some of our managers were promoted too quickly without the necessary prior and ongoing training to protect our cultural values, and to properly react when those values were violated. In assessing performance, we paid more attention to competence than to behaviour.

“Our HR function was not represented at board level, which reduced escalation paths to senior levels of the company when these were most needed. And we tried to find resolution in sexual harassment cases when we should have removed those offenders from our business. In retrospect, this last point was our most grievous error, which led to a reluctance among women to formalise complaints.”

McBride conceded that the above pushed victims of harassment or violence to believe that their only option was to take their experiences to a newspaper. The president also admitted having communicated poorly and ineffectively with members amid the scandal.

“In doing so, commentators concluded that the organisation was cold-hearted and toxic, and that serious allegations of rape had been covered up, when in fact they were never made known to the senior leadership or to the board of the CBI until revealed by The Guardian,” continued McBride. “I will tell you that every member of the CBI’s leadership team is devastated and appalled by the substance of these allegations.

“Our collective failure to completely protect vulnerable employees, to ensure that the alleged incidents could never happen in the first place, and to put in place proper mechanisms to rapidly escalate incidents of this nature to the level of senior leadership, these failings most of all drive the shame…”

The CBI, which has suspended all policy and membership activity until an extraordinary general meeting in June, will now operate a zero-tolerance approach to sexual harassment and bullying behaviour as part of its response. The process of hiring a CBI chief people officer is also underway.

“I hope that we can effectively serve alongside you once more in future, albeit as a changed, and much improved CBI,” stated McBride. “Whether or not that is possible, I hope that what I have shared with you is useful in the work you do to build great cultures in your own organisations.”

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