The dastardly Mr Deedes

Tesco Bank boss Benny Higgins has been appointed chairman of National Galleries of Scotland, a post which he takes up next month. Carrot-topped Higgins, 56, says his love for the arts was spurred by regular visits to Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery as a teenager. What a heady adolescence Benny enjoyed. The libidinous rascal also captained a Celtic youth side which featured ex-Scotland striker, and fellow skirt chaser, ‘Champagne’ Charlie Nicholas. City spinner Roland Rudd paid tribute yesterday to his stockbroker father Tony, who died a fortnight ago aged 93, at a memorial service in St Mary Abbots, Kensington. He told the congregation, which included Sir Roger Carr and Sir Victor Blank, that when the stock market index dipped in 1974 to just 146, his father – a former Second World War pilot – refused to panic, opining: ‘Once you’ve jumped from a burning aeroplane, there are very few dramas in life.’ Advertising mogul Sir Martin Sorrell has threatened to pull out of next year’s Cannes Lions Festival, the Davos- style gathering of advertising executives taking place on the Riviera, due to spiralling costs. Sorrell complains the event has become ‘too bold and brash,’ adding: ‘Cannes in June is not the cheapest place in the world to be.’ Analysts estimate the cost for an agency to send 200 staff is nearly £1m. Meerkat-like Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane’s call for an interest rate bump puts him in conflict with his boss Mark Carney. Yorkshire-born Haldane’s bluntness – remember when he compared economists to hapless weatherman Michael Fish? – is known to give the cautious Canadian the vapours. George Osborne’s swotty ex-chief of staff, Rupert Harrison, comments mischievously: ‘Best guide to Andy’s positions seems to be what will most annoy the governor.’ Goldman Sachs chief Lloyd Blankfein says he has joined Twitter so he can speak out on issues affecting the banking sector, reasoning: ‘I kind of have to be the champion of our people.’ Lloyd’s not one for modesty. During the financial crisis he insisted he was ‘doing God’s work’.