There are parallels between the response of prime minister Gordon Brown to scandal in the City — the hiring of Paul Myners — and how fictional PM James Hacker responded to rumours of a similar scandal in the BBC’s ‘Yes, Prime Minister’. Both believed the best response — and the best way of placating a baying press pack — would be to “appoint somebody”.
On 3 October, prime minister Gordon Brown appointed City of London grandee Paul Myners, former chairman of fund managers Gartmore and a former chairman of Marks & Spencer, as minister for financial services — colloquially known as “City Minister” — to help sort out the brewing scandal in the city.
Intriguingly, Myners had earlier apparently made a generous £12,700 donation to Brown’s leadership election campaign.
However, the current furore over former Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive Sir Fred Goodwin’s pension arrangements suggests that simply “appointing someone” isn’t always the answer. The furore has blown up for one main reason — because Myners failed to stop the “Shred’s” pension pot being substantially increased to £16m by the the RBS board on either 10 or 11 October last year.
Myners is now increasingly being portrayed, especially in the right wing press, as having been outmanouevred by Goodwin and his cronies on the Royal Bank of Scotland’s board.
Another view that is doing the rounds is that Myners lacks political antenna and that his sense of right and wrong may have been dulled by too many long lunches in the City. In my view this is unfair. Myners had barely got his feet under the table in Westminster when he was faced with sorting out RBS and ensuring the departure of his old adversary.
Blog post dated 28 February 2009
I suspect the Government is loving all this outrage and attention to Sir Fred and fat cat pensions because it’s taking the public eye off the questions of the possible criminality of certain individuals responsible for bankrupt Britain. But blaming Lord Myners won’t hide other truths for ever. I read an article in The Sunday Times (my daughter buys it for the Style mag) reporting that two ‘pillars of society’ in the US financial world have been prosecuted for fraud. And, as we know, where the US goes, we follow. So forgetting Sir Fred’s pension for a second, where is Gordon going to start with the UK clear out policy and which criminals is he going to prosecute?