Spotlight on famous five of the Commission
The spotlight will today be on the “famous five” members of the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) as it presents its 200-page interim report.
Two of the commission’s five members come from a banking background, which banks might hope will make them sympathetic to the difficult of running a major lender in current regulatory conditions.
Bill Winters was co-chief executive of JP Morgan Investment bank until last year. He had worked at the bank since 1983, moving from New York to London in 1992.
Martin Taylor is chairman of Syngenta and was chief executive of Barclays from 1994 to 1998.
The other three members come to the task from outside the industry, however. Sir John Vickers is an Oxford economics professor, leaving the university for two years in 1998 to serve on the monetary policy committee and then the Office of Fair Trading.
Clare Spottiswoode is known as a warrior for consumer rights, having been director general of Ofgas and acted for policyholders in negotiations with Aviva.
Martin Wolf is chief economics commentator of the FT and has worked at the World Bank.