Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Lester Knight, Chairman of Aon's Board of Directors. At this time, it's my pleasure to welcome all of you to Aon's annual general meeting of shareholders and call the meeting to order. There are eight items of business on today's agenda. The election of directors, the receipt of Aon's annual report and accounts, together with the reports of the directors and the auditor. Ratification, and the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's independent registered public accounting firm for 2013. The reappointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's U.K. statutory auditor to hold office until the next annual general meeting at which accounts are laid before the company. The approval of a resolution permitting the Board of Directors to set the auditor's remuneration.
An advisory vote on the compensation of the named executive officers as set forth in Aon's proxy statement. An advisory vote on the directors' remuneration report included in Aon's annual report and accounts, and the approval of the Aon plc Global Share Purchase Plan. There will be an opportunity later in the program for questions. We are also joined by representatives of Ernst & Young, they will be available for appropriate questions during the Q&A portion of the meeting. For those of you listening to our meeting this morning via audio webcast, the slides that accompany this presentation can be viewed on Aon's website at www.aon.com. It's now my pleasure to introduce Ram Padmanabhan, the Secretary of the company, who will provide the Secretary's report.
Thank you, Lester. Notice of this annual meeting, together with Aon's proxy statement and annual reports, were made available beginning April 1, 2013, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on March 25, 2013. Aon has appointed Michelle Davies of Computershare Investor Services PLC as Inspector of Election for voting at the annual general meeting. Based on a preliminary report from the Inspector of Election, of the 309,114,125 voting rights of all of the shareholders entitled to vote at the meeting, more than 262.9 million shares, representing more than 85% of the total voting rights of all of the shareholders entitled to vote, are present in person or by proxy at the meeting. As a result, I declare that a quorum is present, we will proceed with the meeting.
A list of the shareholders eligible to vote at this annual general meeting, as certified by Computershare, as well as a copy of the minutes of the 2012 annual general meeting of shareholders are available at this meeting for inspection. Now I'd like to turn the meeting over to Greg Case.
Thank you, Ram. Appreciate it very much. I would like to add my welcome with the chairman to our shareholders, for joining the session today, either online or here in the room. Also on behalf of management, I would like to thank our board of directors for their tireless efforts over the course of last year to support our management team and the mission of Aon. Thank you very much. I am going to provide a brief overview of Aon and the current work and the current mission of the firm, and Christa Davies, our CFO, is going to provide a brief financial overview. To take a step back, understand what Aon's about, what we are trying to do. Understand that Aon is focused on two issues in the global economy. One is the area of risk, helping clients understand, measure, and mitigate risk.
The other is the most important issue is around people, helping clients understand how to deal with and sort through issues around retirement and pensions, health and benefits, talent, rewards. In that context, as you will see on the slide, Aon is roughly 60% of our business overall. 66% is risk, and 34% is in the people businesses, but these are the two missions of our firm, around risk and people. In the context of that, we believe we are in a very strong position. Not only do we have these two platforms, which are the single most significant in the world in their categories, moving more risk than anyone in the world and dealing with people issues in a way that includes advice as well as execution. We stand in a global economy in which these issues have greater needs than ever before.
On the risk side, no matter where you go in the world, the issues of risk are becoming more and more substantial. The magnitude of risk is increasing in the world today. The complexity, how it is interconnected, is becoming more substantial, and it is being looked at more than ever before. Issues around risk literally permeate every economy of the world. The need is very high. Equally, the need is also high on the people side. Virtually every economy you go into in the world today, the issues around people, retirement, talent, health, and benefits, also quite substantial. Your firm, Aon, sits today with these two platforms on risk and people at a time in the global economy when the needs are greater than ever before. That is the overall firm. In that context, we have invested more heavily, we believe, than anyone out there in the world today.
We invested in data, technology, analytics on the risk side, as an example, investments like the Global Risk Insight Platform, which is the single biggest repository of insurance or risk information in the world today, and other risk analytics. Very substantial investments to build our capability in this category, and equal investments to build our capability on the people side. An example here would be something like our launch of corporate healthcare exchanges in the U.S., the first ever fully insured corporate exchange that exists in the world today, launched by your firm, Aon. Very substantial investments in the topic of risk, very substantial investments on the topic of people.
I would just highlight that we look for validation in one and only place, and that's the place from our clients. Our goal, our mission, is to serve clients, helping them with these issues every day, bringing global Aon to our clients in a very local way and serving clients. We've also got some additional recognition, I would just highlight on the slide here, from external resources. That's good to see, but really the fundamental proof point of our firm is our client value and client value added, which is really the strength of the firm, and that's what we're designed to do around these two topics of risk and people. With that brief overview of Aon, I'm going to turn the floor over to Christa Davies to talk about the financial review.
Thank you very much, Greg. I'd like to start with the four key metrics we report to shareholders every quarter and every year. Oops, I'm going the wrong way. Organic revenue growth, margin expansion, EPS growth, and free cash flow growth. You'll note that over the last seven years, we've grown revenue every year except for 2009, in the depth of the economic recession, and we continue to grow in 2013. Margin expansion over this period of time has been 450 basis points, a very impressive achievement. EPS growth compounded 16% growth over the last seven years, a very impressive achievement. Really our most important metric for shareholders and for ourselves is free cash flow. Free cash flows continue to accelerate over the last several years with a 48% growth in free cash flow from 2011 to 2012.
We continue to grow free cash flow over the next couple of years, which we feel will generate substantial value to shareholders. As we look at our long-term margin goals in each of our two segments, 26% margin goal in Risk Solutions and 22% margin goal in HR Solutions, we see substantial operating leverage over the coming years. In our Risk Solutions segment, there are really three key areas that will get us to our 26% margin target that are fully within our control. The first is continued operational improvements, including the flow-through of the remaining restructuring savings. The second is the rollout of the revenue engine globally, which is increasing new business wins and improving our retention rate of existing clients. The third is the continued rollout of Aon Broking and the group-related initiatives, which are improving yield on every $ of premium placed.
Those three initiatives will get us to 26% without any changes in the external marketplace, such as changes in short-term interest rates or GDP or insurance pricing. On the HR Solutions side, there are really three key areas which will get us to our 22% long-term margin target. The first is the completion of the restructuring savings and the delivery of $355 million of annual savings that we originally announced upon the acquisition of Hewitt. The second is the return on substantial investments that Greg described we're making in healthcare exchanges, in our BPO business, in retirement and investment consulting, and the continued improvement in the business. The last is the improvement in our HR BPO business, one of the platforms in which we excel for clients. We see substantial operating leverage in both segments in achieving these long-term margin goals.
Turning to the balance sheet and cash flow, we have a very strong balance sheet with debt to capital remaining around 35%, strong cash and short-term investments. You can see the free cash flow growth I referenced earlier, going from $777 million to $1.15 billion, a 48% growth year-over-year. Very strong growth in free cash flow. We see that free cash flow growing even more substantially over the next 5-6 years. There are really three big drivers of the continued growth in free cash flow. First is organic revenue growth and margin expansion, so operating improvements. Second is a decrease in use of cash, and as you can see here, that we're going to have decreasing uses of cash, which will free up approximately $500 million over the next several years.
Third is the redomestication to the U.K., which is continuing to enable us to access more free cash flow and grow the cash flow through a reduction in tax rate. We feel like the growth in cash flow over the next several years is going to be even more substantial and drive substantial value creation for shareholders. With that, I'll turn the meeting back to Lester.
Thank you, Greg and Christa. Before we move to vote on the resolutions, does anybody have any questions or comments about what you've heard or for us at this time? Not seeing any questions. I'm going to turn the meeting back over to Ram, and he's going to bring the resolutions to the meeting.
Thanks, Lester. The following individuals have been nominated for election as directors of the company, and each will be elected by way of separate ordinary resolution of the company. Lester Knight, Greg Case, Fulvio Conti, Cheryl Francis, Edgar Jannotta, Michael Losh, Robert Morrison, Richard Myers, Richard Notebaert, Gloria Santona, and Carolyn Woo. There are seven additional matters scheduled to be acted upon at the meeting. In accordance with the recommendation of the board of directors, I move the following proposals for approval. The receipt of the annual report and accounts, together with the reports of the directors and the auditor. The ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's independent registered public accounting firm for the year 2013.
The reappointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's U.K. statutory auditor to hold office until the conclusion of the next annual general meeting at which accounts are laid before the company. The authorization of the Board of Directors to determine the auditor's remuneration. The advisory vote on executive compensation. The advisory vote on the Director remuneration report. The approval of Aon plc's Global Share Purchase Plan. Each to be proposed as a separate ordinary resolution. As an ordinary resolution, the resolution requires a simple majority of the votes cast in favor of the resolution to pass. As required by articles, the vote will be taken on a poll. As a result, each person, represented in person or by proxy, is entitled to one vote for each share held. I'll turn it back over to you, Lester.
We will now conduct the official business of the meeting. It's now 8:13 A.M. British Summer Time. I formally propose that each of the resolutions set out in the notice of the meeting, which forms the first part of the company's proxy statement, are put to the meeting, and I declare the polls open for voting on all resolutions. Let me spend a moment reviewing the voting procedures. Proxy statements and proxy voting cards were sent to all shareholders prior to this meeting. Those of you who returned proxies prior to this meeting authorized the persons named in the proxy to vote on all proposals coming before the meeting. Similarly, if you granted your proxy over the telephone or internet, you do not need to vote during the meeting.
Any shareholder who has not submitted a proxy or wishes to change his or her vote, please stand and you'll be given a ballot. Anyone who still has a proxy card should now hand it to the Inspector of Election so it may be counted as a vote executed in person at the meeting. Will the Inspector of Election please collect all ballots at this time. Are all the ballots in? Thank you. All the ballots are in. I now declare the polls closed. Ram, please note the time of closing of the polls for the minutes. The Inspector of Election is requested to tabulate the proxies and ballots and report the final voting results to the Secretary. It's my pleasure to introduce to you our non-executive Directors. I'd like those seated in front to stand when I call their name and be recognized. Fulvio Conti. Cheryl Francis.
Ned Jannotta. Mike Losh. Bob Morrison. Dick Myers. Dick Notebaert. Gloria Santona. Carolyn Woo. Please join me in thanking the Directors for all the time and effort they devote on behalf of Aon and its shareholders. I'd also like to thank Greg Case and Christa Davies and their management team for their efforts on behalf of the company and its shareholders, as well as Freshfields for providing the meeting space for this annual general meeting. I'd like to ask Ram to report on the results of the voting.
Following a review of proxies received and tabulated before the start of the meeting, each nominee for election as director received a majority of the votes cast at this meeting, with the number of votes cast for each nominee for director exceeding the number of votes cast against each nominee for director.
In addition, each of the following resolutions, the receipt of the annual report and accounts, the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young as Aon's independent registered public accounting firm for the year 2013, the reappointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's U.K. statutory auditor, the authorization of the Board of Directors to set auditors' remuneration, the advisory vote on executive compensation, the advisory vote on the directors' remuneration report, and the approval of the Aon plc Global Share Purchase Plan, received a majority of the votes present and entitled to vote at this meeting, and therefore are approved. These results are provisional.
The Inspector of Election will furnish a written report of the final vote count, which will be attached as an exhibit to the minutes of this meeting, reported in a filing by Aon with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and made available on the company's website. I'll turn the meeting back over to Lester for closing.
Thank you, Ram. I'd like to express our sincere appreciation to all shareholders who attended the meeting. At this point, I'd like to declare the meeting closed.