Criticism of the award to Carlos Tavares came as Macron entered the final weekend of the French election campaign seeking to oust far-right challenger Marine Le Pen, who also condemned the French-Italian’s paycheck. In the run-up to the April 24 presidential election, the issue of executive pay has entered a campaign dominated by voters’ concerns about high energy costs and wider cost-of-living problems. The unions and shareholders have opposed the payment for Tavares, the former head of the French company Peugeot PSA, which merged with the Italian Fiat Chrysler last year. The Portuguese executive will receive the multi-million euro package for 2021, despite the fact that the majority of investors voted against Stellantis’s remuneration plan for its senior executives. Macron described Tavares ‘pay package as “shocking and excessive” on Friday and said a “battle” would have to be waged to ensure executives’ pay levels were not abusive. “At some point we need to set ceilings and bring in a governance structure at European level that makes things acceptable, otherwise at some point society will explode,” Macron told Franceinfo radio. “People can not fight the high cost of living and see this kind of amount.” “Of course it is shocking,” Lepen told BFM TV when asked about the pay package. “It’s even more shocking when company bosses have problems. That’s happening a lot. “ Macron, a former banker who came to power in 2017 on a pro-business platform and has long been described as the “president of the rich” by political opponents, said he was in favor of wealth creation and “freedoms” for companies, but said Stellantis The salary plans were “astronomical”. He said France could also look at ways to allow staff to benefit more from the company’s profits through equity schemes. Le Pen has been campaigning hard in recent months on issues such as food inflation and high fuel prices, which have risen further since Russia invaded Ukraine. Her emphasis on the high cost of living, far from her party’s long-standing focus on immigration issues that remain at the heart of her manifesto, has hit voters.

Polls suggest Macron has about 53% of the vote in the second round, with Lepen limiting him to 47%. Stellantis has been set up in the Netherlands, meaning the French government has little influence over its governance rules, although state-owned investment bank Bpifrance, the carmaker’s fourth-largest shareholder, has voted against the pay plan. PSA and the car loan arm had to be rescued by the French government in 2012 with state-backed loans following a prolonged recession, although that was before Tavares, a former Renault executive, joined the group in 2014. “Stellantis recalls that under the leadership of Carlos Tavares, in less than eight years, Groupe PSA went from a state of near bankruptcy to being ranked as the leading company in its industry globally,” the company said in a statement. The world’s fourth-largest carmaker, which reported record profits and margins last year, said it would consider a non-binding vote against its 2022 plans, though it did not say how.