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Political suicide
Norman Tebbit once worked up an auction for Rover — or, rather, for British Leyland, which in those days was the name on its collar. At the Department of Trade and Industry, he talked to General Motors, which in those days had the money. GM wanted the trucks, but was willing to buy the whole business. Then Ford heard about it, and wanted the K-series engines and the tax losses. Then the story leaked, and Tory MPs from the nut-and-bolt belt — in those days, there were some — joined forces with Labour to rescue this national treasure. Lord Tebbit was accused of stabbing British Leyland in the back. ‘If I did,’ he said, ‘it was with a chequebook’ — but the whips got cold feet, and so did the Cabinet, and GM took its chequebook away, and the chance never recurred. Cause of death: not a stab in the back, but political suicide. Dooms like these tend to recur.
Shop till you drop
These may have been hard times for people who make things — such as cars — but for people who sell things that others make, life was never better. A boom led by consumption and imports and a trade gap of £58 billion a year say something for our retailers’ achievements. In Trolley Wars (Profile, £17.99) Judi Bevan tells their story — but, of course, these wars have winners and losers. Famous names like Boots mislay their sense of purpose. Tesco eats Sainsbury’s lunch. Sir Peter Davis is brought back to do the job he always wanted and to have one more run round the course of seven-figure salaries, bonuses, share options, pensions and so on. His plans misfire and the Sainsbury family realise that the cashflow to their charities may not be there for ever. The boom may not be there for ever, either. There are portents of harsher times ahead, of more bitter warfare and, of necessity, more losers.
Thinking man’s pension
In the days when thought was not a prerequisite, among stockbrokers or among their clients, Philip Darwin of Laurence Prust was known as the thinking man’s stockbroker. Now in retirement, he has been applying his mind to the real cost of Gordon Brown’s raid on the pension funds. Eight years ago, the incoming Chancellor helped himself to £5 billion out of the kitty, and he has repeated the act year by year. So the direct cost is now £40 billion, but the funds need to work out how much they would need to invest so as to replace the missing £5 billion of annual income. A yield of 5 per cent would require a lump sum of £100 billion — enough to ruin the pension providers, or to make them close their schemes while they still can. Mr Darwin might add that the bill for insolvent schemes will now be sent to the solvent schemes, by a compulsory levy. Thanks, Chancellor.
Moth, mother, most
Good news from France, unless you are a female grape-moth. On a whistle-stop (siffle-arr
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