Come on board, minister
MY LAW OF non-execs says that a man is known by the companies that keep him, and for ministers, that goes double. So a retired chancellor has nothing to fear from going on the board of N.M.Rothschild. I am sure that his other board — First Philip- pine Investment Trust — is splendid too, if not quite in the same bracket. David How- ell is the latest retired minister to learn what can go wrong. He has resigned as a director of Queens Moat, the hotel group, where the accounts now look like matters of opinion (mine is that the shareholders should expect nothing and avoid disap- pointment.) Another retired chancellor joined the board of GPA, the world's biggest leasers of aircraft, which seemed to have found fairy gold at Shannon Airport but when assayed did not come up to proof. Yet another retired chancellor became a director of the Real Estate Fund of Ameri- ca, and later found that he could not visit the United States without being liable to arrest — a disadvantage in his post as shad- ow Foreign Secretary. This was Reggie Maudling, who had wanted a little pot of money for his old age, but got neither. Mr Howell now says that the non-execs at Queen's Moat were misled, and for all I know they were. Non-execs in general and public figures in particular need to ask themselves why they have been asked to the party, and what they bring to it, beyond (of course) their incisive intellects, their valu- able connections and their handsome faces. If they can work that one out with suitable modesty, they may save themselves a lot of trouble.
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