Jobs for the boys
THESE INSTITUTIONS, like committees or summits, are easier to start than to stop. Already the usual suspects are rounding themselves up for M. Attali's job — Euro- apparatchiks, Rentadutchmen and, from France, a flying wedge of enarques. As The Dunciad so nearly concludes: 'Thy hand, great Enarque! lets the curtain fall, And universal darkness buries all.' Now is the moment to decide what, if anything, this
bank is for — then we might be able to find someone to do it. I would model the EBRD on the International Finance Corporation, which is the World Bank agency that works with the private sector in developing coun- tries, and puts the rest of that bloated fatty- puff to shame. This would therefore be a job for an international investment banker who can raise his sights (such as Michael Von Clemm) and knows a good firm of office-movers. I should in fairness add that the man who has made IFC hum is an old hand from the Treasury, Sir William Ryrie. I am sorry that he is retiring, and as sorry to think that his is the last such job in British hands. The French carve them up, and are content to leave us with the marble halls.
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