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Sunday Telegraph: Watts: 'I always acted properly':
"...the Financial Services Authority last week announced
that it would take no action against him over the
company's oil reserves scandal. The move was greeted
with surprise by company watchers as it came more than a
year after the FSA fined Royal Dutch Shell £17m for
overstating its oil and gas reserves.": Sunday 13
November 2005
By Sylvia
Pfeifer (Filed: 13/11/2005)
Sir Philip Watts, the former
chairman of Shell, the oil giant, has launched a robust
defence of his actions over the reserves scandal at the
company. Watts was speaking out for the first time after
the Financial Services Authority last week announced
that it would take no action against him over the
company's oil reserves scandal.
The move was greeted with surprise
by company watchers as it came more than a year after
the FSA fined Royal Dutch Shell £17m for overstating its
oil and gas reserves. It also came after Watts's lawyers
earlier this summer clashed with the regulator's
enforcement arm in front of the FSA's regulatory
decisions committee, which decides whether allegations
warrant action.
Watts said: "I have always accepted
that the reserves recategorisation happened 'on my
watch'. But I have also always maintained that I at all
times acted properly and in good faith. That is why my
having been exonerated of these damaging allegations is
so important to me.
"Being given the opportunity
recently to make written and oral representations to the
FSA's regulatory decisions committee was the first real
opportunity I have had in this entire saga properly to
respond to the allegations made against me. "
He added: "The past 18 months have
been enormously demanding. I could not have survived it
without the support of my wife Jan, my family and close
friends."
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