Governance, controls and assurance

Governance – roles and responsibilities

Our Corporate and Social Responsibility Committee assesses our policies and performance with respect to our Business Principles, Code of Conduct, HSSE & SP standards and major issues of public concern on behalf of the Board of Royal Dutch Shell. The committee is made up of four Non-executive Directors and meets quarterly.

Our Chief Executive is accountable for sustainable development and he chairs our HSSE and Social Performance Executive, which reviews environmental and social performance and sets priorities, key performance indicators and targets.

Each business is responsible for complying with Shell’s environmental and social requirements and achieving its own specific targets in this area.

Sustainable development is also part of how we assess our overall business performance and pay our people. It counts for 20% of the Shell Scorecard that we use in determining bonuses.

Controls – the way we operate

Sustainable development training for new employees, Port Arthur, USA

The Shell General Business Principles, Code of Conduct and our Commitment and Policy on Health, Safety, Security and Environment (HSSE) & Social Performance (SP) apply to all Shell companies and joint ventures we control. We also have a set of more detailed mandatory standards and manuals covering social and environmental topics, with requirements that apply to all Shell companies.

In joint ventures we do not control or operate, we encourage the joint venture to operate in line with our principles  and expect them to apply standards equal to our own.

We consider environmental and social factors for any new project and carry out an integrated environmental, health and social impact assessment before we start work.

Assurance – monitoring compliance

The heads of our businesses and functions report to the Chief Executive at the end of each year on how they have applied our Business Principles and standards. If they have not met requirements they must explain what they are doing to achieve this.

Shell Internal Audit investigates fraud, compliance and other control incidents. Ethical and legal incidents are reported to the Executive Committee and to the Audit Committee. We regularly audit the HSSE management systems at our facilities. Our process safety specialists do dedicated safety audits.

All our major plants are externally certified to international environmental standards, such as ISO 14001. External panels and observers help us monitor environmental and social performance.