City Spy: Sounds like Kate isn’t booked for a holiday job

Speculation has linked Kate Swann, the departing boss of book retailer WH Smith, with a number of high-profile jobs in the retail sector.

But the latest feverish rumours are that she may have been lined up to replace Peter Long, the highly regarded chief executive of Tui Travel.

But insiders at the tour operator behind the Thomson and First Choice brands are baffled by this speculation, and say there is no truth in it.

Although no one has expected that the industrious Swann would decide to take a long holiday once she quits her office at WH Smith next month, it does not seem that she will be partaking in any sort of travel excursion with Tui.

In the wake of City Spy’s revelation about how Lloyds Banking Group corporate affairs director Matt Young was wooed from Santander UK on a mighty £1.34 million pay package, more news emerges of City PR men coining it.

The just-published Bank of England annual report shows that ex-BBC man Nils Blythe, director of communications for departing Guv’nor Sir Mervyn King, earned a very decent £166,642 last year — a 3.5% rise at a time of public-sector austerity. Compared with Young, Blythe’s pay looks modest but it still means the Threadneedle Street spinner trousered more than the Prime Minister.

The Bank of England is 100%-owned by taxpayers, unlike Lloyds Banking Group which is 39%-owned by the state. The difference, when it comes to being a spin doctor, would appear to be more than £1 million a year in pay.

To Banqueting House in Whitehall for Cavendish Corporate Finance’s 25th anniversary summer party where the 400 guests, including cabinet ministers George Osborne, William Hague, Chris Grayling and Theresa May, were given a lesson from senior partner Howard Leigh, pictured, on entrepreneurial branding and the value of staring out of windows.

“Twenty-five years and one month ago, I found myself in two rented rooms having decided to start a new business,” he told guests. “The concept was clear: to be the only adviser who would help owners and businesses to sell their prized enterprise without the conflicts which I saw that all the other advisers faced. The only question was what to call this new business. Needless to say the answer was provided, as is so often the case, by staring out the window, which at that time was onto Cavendish Square.

“But would this work? As I went back to my old firm, Deloitte Haskins & Sells, to say my goodbyes, I decided to market-test it and when one of the partners of Deloittes asked me where I was going, I replied: ‘Cavendish Corporate Finance’, to which he said: ‘Oh yes, a very fine firm indeed.’”

* Beep! It’s a text from Vodafone: “Vodafone VIP just got better. With our new mobile app, you can feel like a VIP when you’re out and about. For offers like £5 to spend at Warehouse, download the app.” City Spy thinks Vodafone needs to reassess its understanding of “VIP”.

* Did those clever people at Brand Union who came up with new name Essentra for fag filters-maker Filtrona bother to check anagrams of their creation? City Spy has run the name through Mr Babbage’s machine and come up with: assenter, rats seen, sea stern, set snare and tsar seen. But the best ones are arse nets, nest arse and, of course, ten arses.

* Torrential rain this year and a lack of early spring sun have put the UK plum harvest in jeopardy, apparently. But help is at hand. “The Worcestershire town of Pershore has called in Paul Johnson, the Pershore Plum Charmer, to play his clarinet to the fledgling plums to encourage a bountiful harvest,” trills an email. “Dressed in ancient purple robes, Paul will serenade the young fruit with music ranging from Elgar to Elbow.” Next Tuesday is the appointed day when the Charmer will play. Hurry, hurry to Worcestershire, then.

* With the plethora of government schemes meant to kick-start the housing market, one would expect some confusion. The Homebuilders Federation (developers) and Rightmove (estate agents) are pleased to tell City Spy that the Help to Buy scheme, by which the taxpayers will in effect underwrite builders’ and agents’ profits, has been “well received” by about two thirds of all prospective buyers in Greater London. The scheme has, of course, been widely condemned for its largesse to wealthy — even foreign — buyers of expensive new homes, which will create a false boom. Perhaps this caused the HBF to send out its press release under the subject line “consumer support for Right to Buy scheme”.