Moneyman banked on revolution
SIR BRUCE Pattullo was an astute and respected financier who ushered in change at the Bank of Scotland, modernising its monetary processes and strengthening its international standing. He served as the bank’s 22nd Governor from 1991 to 1998 and oversaw a period of stable growth, even during the recession of the early part of the decade.
Under his watch, the Bank of Scotland became the first financial institution in the UK to offer electronic banking services from home in 1985. Pattullo also involved the bank in the financing of North Sea oil.
David Bruce Pattullo was born in Edinburgh, the son of lawyer Colin Pattullo, who largely represented Scottish rubber planters in Malay, and his wife Elizabeth (née Bruce). With his elder sister, Isobel, Pattullo was evacuated to their grandmother’s farm in Fife during the Second World War.
His father was awarded the Military Cross but died in Naples before the war’s end after he was wounded at Anzio.
Pattullo was educated at Belhaven Hill prep school near Dunbar and then Rugby. After completing his national service with the Royal Scots, he was seconded to the Queen’s Own Nigeria Regiment and posted to the city of Kano.
Pattullo joined the Royal Bank of Scotland in 1961 on the graduate recruitment programme at branches in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Three years after joining the Bank, he won the top prize of the Scottish Institute of Bankers. He was appointed general manager of finance in 1973 and the bank’s treasurer and general manager in 1979 after turning 40.
At the bank’s tercentenary events in 1995, he told staff: “There is no substitute for good old-fashioned common sense.”
His only controversy came with his resignation in 1996 in protest at Standard Life Board’s decision to sell its 30 per cent stake in the Bank of Scotland.
Standard Life did not notify him in advance of its move, even though he was one of its board members, despite the risk it posed of a takeover.
He was so enraged he ordered his chauffeur to drive him to Standard Life’s headquarters, a mile from the Bank of Scotland office on the Mound, so that he could deliver his resignation letter in person.
Pattullo, who died of cancer, was knighted in 1995. He is survived by his wife, Fiona Nicholson, and their three sons and daughter.