Accountants probed

THe chairman of Legal & General is reportedly being lined up to run a probe into a City watchdog.

Sir John Kingman, formerly a top Treasury official, is being considered to run a review into the financial Reporting Council.

If selected, the 48-yearold will be responsible for a review into the responsibilities of the regulator, which oversees accountants but has been repeatedly slammed for letting them off the hook over serious blunders.

The fRC was branded toothless by MPs after it dropped probes into beancounters which approved the books of failed lender HBOS, missed problems at Barclays and overlooked a black hole at Tesco.