David Maddox: The Final Countdown (for some)
The number is finally up today for an institution that much of the nation has done its calculations by for many years and millions of eyes will be fixed to their TV screens to see the final moment. The end of this great British institution has vexed politicians and the media and several campaigns to save it have been in vain. In the end the money was just not there to keep it going.
I am of course referring to Carol Vordeman's last appearance on Countdown which will be screened this afternoon on Channel 4. She leaves because she refused to take a pay cut from £800,000 a year to £100,000. In 26 years she has defied nature and transformed from a shy dowdy number turner with good mental arithmetic skills to glamour puss TV personality who can turn both numbers and letters. Tears will be shed, but only one job will be lost with the hole left filled by a new presenter.
About 120 miles down the road from the studios in Leeds to the NEC in Birmingham we will very shortly hear of the final demise of the Bank of Scotland in any form other than a Scottish front for Lloyds. It has been lost because the UK Government were not willing to put up an estimated £500 million to keep it independent and its own board were set on pushing through the takeover.
It will be the end of 300 years of history which saw the bank go from being a dowdy Scottish venture to an international glamour puss of the financial world. Tears will be shed, thousands of jobs lost and it will leave significant holes in high streets across the UK and in Edinburgh's status as an international centre for financial services.
I am of course referring to Carol Vordeman's last appearance on Countdown which will be screened this afternoon on Channel 4. She leaves because she refused to take a pay cut from £800,000 a year to £100,000. In 26 years she has defied nature and transformed from a shy dowdy number turner with good mental arithmetic skills to glamour puss TV personality who can turn both numbers and letters. Tears will be shed, but only one job will be lost with the hole left filled by a new presenter.
About 120 miles down the road from the studios in Leeds to the NEC in Birmingham we will very shortly hear of the final demise of the Bank of Scotland in any form other than a Scottish front for Lloyds. It has been lost because the UK Government were not willing to put up an estimated £500 million to keep it independent and its own board were set on pushing through the takeover.
It will be the end of 300 years of history which saw the bank go from being a dowdy Scottish venture to an international glamour puss of the financial world. Tears will be shed, thousands of jobs lost and it will leave significant holes in high streets across the UK and in Edinburgh's status as an international centre for financial services.
Labels: Carol Vordeman, David Maddox, HBOS
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