Right off the scale
THE trouble is that he is running short of offices to shut. National Westminster had a beauty, but the Competition Commission would never have let him near it. Across borders, economies are always harder to find, and Sir Brian jibs at owning banks in countries where the staff cannot be fired or, if they are, must still be paid. Even so, the City expects his successor to look for some- thing big in Europe. An Anglo-Dutch bank- ing group to go with Shell and Unilever? For corporate tedium it would come right off the Powell Duffryn scale, by which this factor is traditionally measured. Before Sir Brian goes I wish that he would put the Equitable Life out of its misery. In its own market, it was and it should, in new hands, be the low-cost producer.
Previous page
