LONDON, June 21 (Reuters) - Prime Minister Theresa May's government dropped plans to clamp down on executive pay and give workers a greater say on their company's strategy when it set out its policy agenda on Wednesday.
May had previously set out plans for the state to take a bigger role in corporate Britain, saying that shareholders needed to approve executive pay at annual meetings in a bid to curb mounting anger over the soaring level of pay for top bosses.
But chastened by an election result that left her Conservative Party short of a majority in parliament, May watered down many of her pledges and the government's agenda did not mention many of the changes on corporate governance when it was published on Wednesday.
It did stick to a proposal to intervene in any foreign takeovers of infrastructure that affect national security and said it would seek to tackle the gender pay gap.
"It's good to see that the recent heatwave has warmed the government's view of business and its contribution to people's lives," Carolyn Fairbairn, the director general of the CBI business lobby group, said in a statement.
May had previously set out plans to subject executive pay packages to strict annual shareholder votes and said listed companies would have to publish the ratio of executive to average pay, if she was re-elected.
May had also said listed companies would have to either nominate a director from the workforce, create a formal employee advisory council or assign specific responsibility for employee representation to a designated non-executive director.
(Reporting by Kate Holton; editing by Paul Sandle and Susan Thomas) ((kate.holton@thomsonreuters.com; 0044 207 542 8560; Reuters Messaging: kate.holton.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))
