The dastardly Mr Deedes
Former investment banker Emmanuel Macron has emerged as the dark horse in France’s Presidential elections, where he is rising in the polls behind front runners Francois Fillon and Marine Le Pen. The toothy millionaire, 39, who is standing as an independent, is a former executive at Rothschild & Co where he was a protégé of the firm’s resplendent patriarch, Baron David de Rothschild, 74. Says a Rothschild source: ‘David’s been insisting for months Macron will win.’
The £4.9m-a-year Dixons chief executive Seb James, 50, a contemporary of David Cameron, says his time at Eton was blighted by homesickness. He tells Management Today: ‘I was quite unhappy in my first few years. A typical scene would be me on a payphone to my mum in a central area, crying while trying to put the 2p pieces into the slot while someone behind me was giving me a wedgie.’ How cruel. Do we think bully boy Dave did the honours?
Drollest response of the week goes to Tom Williams, bald, straight-talking chief operating officer of Airbus, the Frenchbased aircraft maker whose wings are manufactured in the UK. Asked yesterday by hawk-eyed Treasury Select Committee chair- man Andrew Tyrie how Airbus would fare without the UK, Williams replied drily. ‘We’d just be a bus.’
Stinker of a morning yesterday for £5.4m-a-year BT boss Gavin Patterson. Not only was the firm forced to write down the value of its Italian unit by £530m, but the subsequent 19pc drop in BT’s share price then left Patterson, 49, £2m poorer. Into every life a little rain must fall I suppose, even Gorgeous Gav’s.
Having just landed a £200,000-a-year advisory role with BlackRock, former chancellor George Osborne couldn’t resist informing Twitter followers of another high profile gig yesterday, announcing: ‘Honoured to speak at Chinese New Year dinner alongside Mr Jin, president of Asian Infrastructure Bank, to promote UK/China golden era in Year of the Rooster.’ A non- Osborne supporter Tweets back: ‘Apt in the year of the rooster for a c**k to be giving the speech.’ Uncalled for!