"Arrogant superior young toffs...”

“The arrogant, superior young toffs who lead the Conservative Party, neither of whom have done a serious day's work in their life... David Cameron was executive at Carlton Television which lost over a billion pounds while he was there. I take no lectures from that young man about business competence. ...Nor can we blame Gordon Brown for the sub-prime disaster in the United States of America or the recklessness of bankers.”

This was my crimbo present come early from Paul Myners on BBC1 Question Time
last week. According to today's Professional Pensions the Tories have now made an official complaint about Paul’s comments. He is the Chair of the government’s “Personal Accounts Delivery Body” PADB.

This is actually one of the most important governmental bodies you have never heard of – hopefully, soon up to 10 million Brits will be members of this “National pension scheme” which for the first time will oblige firms to contribute to their workers pension future (there are the usual “get out” clauses). The PADB should result in millions of people being brought out of poverty in retirement.

This is a really vital body and I suspect (hope) that while Paul was a probably a little unwise in his comments, as Chair of the PADB it will soon blow over. Part of his charm is that he is a bit of a maverick at times.

To me it shows how sensitive the Tories are to the justifiable accusation about Cameron that he is a “out of touch toff”

Hopefully, at worse Paul will just have his knuckles rapped. He is probably one of the most respected businessman of our time - chairman of the Guardian Media Group, the Low Pay Commission (which sets the minimum wage and advises the government on its implementation), and chair of the trustees at the Tate; a member of the Court of Directors of the Bank of England. Previously been Chairman of Marks & Spencer, and an Executive Director at NatWest; Trustee of the Brownite think tank The Smith Institute and has been dubbed "Gordon Brown's favourite businessman"; He is also part of the management team put together by US private equity house JC Flowers which is bidding to take control of Northern Rock.

He has written to the Tories pointing out he appeared on the programme in a personal capacity.He wrote: "I should also add that you make no reference in your letter to two other occasions on the same programme when I was deeply critical of government policy and actions. No mention was made of PADA or pensions in my description or during the programme."

I have meet Paul at various pension conferences and reminded him that Tower Hamlets pension scheme had sacked him (he was head of Gartmore Fund Managers at the time) in the past. Which he took in good part and described that occasion as the “worse day of his life” (joke). Of course being a staffside observer and not allowed to be a full voting member of the scheme I was able to blame everyone else for this decision!

NB - I thought Labour Employment & Welfare Minister Caroline Flint was very,very good at QT