The odd premise behind the series is that a detective gets hit by a car and ends up back in 1973 as part of a gruesome CID double act who make The Sweeney’s Regan and Carter look as terrifying as TV property gurus Colin and Justin.
From some documents that landed on my desk last week, it seems that a group of executive ministers have suffered the same fate. Why else would they be considering such outdated and unfashionable plans as a publicly run investment bank or giving workers the first option to buy companies up for sale? Or, given that one of the biggest bugbears for business is increased regulation, why consider introducing “guidance” on workers’ rights? To top it all, they go and spoil their one sensible suggestion, changing the structure of public procurement to allow smaller firms to bid, by linking it to those companies’ environmental, training and labour records. Presumably a new public sector agency would have to be set up to supervise it.
These are among a raft of proposals being looked at by ministers as they head into the 2007 election trying to live up to their boast of making the economy the No 1 priority.
Most of these ideas sound remarkably like the discredited and ridiculed policies that went out of fashion with Boney M.
Forgive me for dragging our elected representatives, kicking and screaming, back into the 21st century, but we don’t need another publicly run investment bank that targets riskier companies and others who fail to get funding. The market sorts all that out. Anyway, we already have the Co-Investment fund and soon the Scottish Investment fund will look at the £2-5m range.
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Another “flower power” suggestion is for a co-operative development agency. No, it’s not a supermarket collective, but another public sector agency that could help fund employees buying a company, among other things. Giving staff first refusal works as a political soundbite, but it is simply not practical. And which foreign company is going to invest in Scotland with that hanging over its head? One development, which is worryingly close to being policy, is linking cuts in business rates with research and development spend. This might be laudable, but, again, it is not practical. The vast majority of businesses benefiting from a cut in rates won’t need to spend on R&D as they are very small. Come up with an R&D scheme that targets those companies that need to spend more, and also cut rates. But do not link the two.
Like Chopper bikes and Fab 208, state intervention was all the rage back in the 1970s. It didn’t work. I have two words for those who think it could — British Leyland.
There is hope, however. Those who stick with Life on Mars are likely to discover that the time-travelling cop is not really back in the 1970s, but just dreaming while in a coma. Let’s hope most of these silly ideas disappear when ministers wake up in the real world.
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Power ranger
It was a quiet start for Philip Bowman at ScottishPower last week. Apart from some Russian madness suggesting Gazprom was now eyeing it up, the new chief executive was able to get through his first few days in relative peace.
Bowman’s style was described as “different” by a company insider and, judging from the tone used, the new man is being seen as a welcome change. Indeed, it sounds as if Bowman is still reaping the benefits of his conference call with all staff, in which he denied suggestions that he was coming to Glasgow to sell the company.
The new boss managed a tour of the company’s offices at Atlantic Quay, Cathcart, Bellshill and London during the week. He should enjoy the peace and quiet while he can as there will undoubtedly be some difficult weeks ahead.
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Home goal
Good news for Aberdeen Asset Management. Assets under management rose to £71.7 billion at the end of December, fuelled by rising markets and inflows.
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The company, which bought the UK-based fund arm of Deutsche Bank last July, said it had made a solid start to the new financial year and was looking forward to continuing its progress in the coming months.
What a difference a year makes. At the start of 2005, AAM was still reeling after paying out £78m as part of the fallout from the split caps investment scandal. However, last December, AAM reported a 70% increase in full-year pre-tax profits to £25.7m, up from £15m the previous year.
AAM is thought to be involved in the £600m auction of Gartmore, which Nationwide, the US mutual, is selling off to concentrate on financial services products in America.
Meanwhile, Aston Villa are looking for new shirt sponsors after AAM, which bought shirt sponsors DWS, indicated they won’t renew the deal when the contract ends this summer. What a pity. It would have riled the Old Firm to see Aberdeen in the Premiership, even if only on Villa’s tops.