Shareholders blast pay of GM chief executive

Shareholders also defeated a proposal under which at least 75 percent of future stock options and restricted stock awards for senior executives would be tied to the company's performance.

John Lauve of Holly, Mich., who sponsored the proposal on performance pay, said GM's market share, stock price and credit rating have decreased in recent years, but management and directors have not been held accountable.

"We either need to change this company or have the Japanese come in and run the whole place," said Lauve, whose proposal received only 16 percent support in preliminary voting results.

The proposal to give shareholders an annual advisory vote on executive compensation fared better, receiving almost 32 percent support, but fell fall short of passage. The sponsor of the proposal, John Chevedden of Redondo Beach, Calif., said the company successfully blocked an effort to have a similar measure put to a vote at last year's annual meeting.

"It's long overdue, especially given the results this year of our company," Chevedden said, referring to GM's $38.7 billion loss in 2007.

According to an Associated Press calculation, GM chairman and chief executive officer Rick Wagoner received compensation valued at $15.7 million for 2007, up 64 percent from the previous year.

"I came to scold you for your greed," Mary Ann Wiley of Seattle told Wagoner.

Wiley, 77, said she has owned General Motors Corp. stock for 70 years, but that Tuesday marked her first annual meeting. Wiley said afterward that GM has moved far too slowly in developing new and better products and embracing next-generation fuels, and that management should not receive higher salaries and bonuses when the company is struggling.

"If the company does not do well, management should take an equal hit, and I don't think they've taken an equal hit," she said, adding that GM has grown so big that it has lost its humility and its "sense of democracy," not caring about shareholder concerns.

"This was a charade," said Wiley, looking out over the ornate Gold Ballroom of the Hotel DuPont, where GM has held its annual meetings for more than a decade.