Direct Line boss Adam Winslow to step down within days as Aviva completes £3.7bn takeover
Direct Line boss Adam Winslow is set to step down within days as the company's £3.7billion takeover by Aviva completes.
Winslow has run the insurer for just over a year, having joined from Aviva. Jason Storah, who filled his old role at Aviva, will now be in charge of Direct Line.
There is said to be no love lost between Winslow and Aviva boss Amanda Blanc, and his position has looked precarious since the takeover was agreed in December.
Aviva expects it to complete next Tuesday. Direct Line swung to a £205million profit in 2024 from a £190million loss the year before.
Now Winslow is leaving alongside chief financial officer Jane Poole, who will be replaced by Aviva's Stephen Pond.
The tie-up will create a significant force in the motor insurance sector, estimated to cover more than a fifth of the market.
Winslow was handed a £7.8million pay package, much of it a payment to cover the loss in earnings after joining from Aviva.
Aviva has said around 2,300 jobs are at risk in the wake of a deal which is being probed by the UK's Competition and Markets Authority.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Herald Scotland
an hour ago
- The Herald Scotland
Landlords threaten to walk away from 5G connectivity scheme
Private and public landowners warn they have already lost out on around £200 million each year following significant changes made in 2017. Changes to the Electronic Communications Code meant telecoms firms were no longer required to pay market rent to landlords, with some landowners witnessing a 90% reduction in annual fees. It affects landowners including farmers, but also affects councils, charities and small businesses. In some cases rents originally agreed at around £5,500 per year fell to £3.50 per year, with landowners also stating they feel trapped in the agreement. The UK Government is consulting on changes to the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure (PSTI) Act that could see landowners refuse to allow the equipment on their property and therefore slowing down key connectivity targets. Russell Glendinning, managing director of Cell:cm Chartered Surveyors, a firm representing landowners of telecommunications infrastructure , said the implications would be "chilling". Read more: Mr Glendinning told The Herald on Sunday: "Scotland's digital rollout is being undermined by a failed UK-wide legal framework. "Changes to the 2017 Electronic Communications Code has significantly strained the relationship between landowners and mobile operators. "Many site providers have been drawn into lengthy and complex disputes in an attempt to protect operational requirements at their property against operators' technical and operational needs, often coupled with steeply reduced rents - and in some cases, site owners have even been ordered to repay substantial sums. "This has created a chilling effect on the willingness of both private and public landowners to host infrastructure." Landowners have urged the UK Government to rethink the legislation and listen to industry voices. Read more: The National Farming Union (NFU) and the British Property Federation (BPF) has since written to the government, warning that if action is not taken, landowners will walk away and 5G ambitions will be missed, while Scotland's 'fragile' connectivity will deteriorate further. Underserved parts of Scotland, like the Highlands and Islands and Argyll and Bute are particularly at risk. However, official statistics also revealed that Glasgow is now amongst the UK's worst five cities for fibre coverage. While the city is Scotland's largest urban hub, just 57.8% of premises have access to full fibre broadband. The ongoing row between landowners and telecoms firms has also stalled the UK rollout of 5G, with the UK now ranked 30th out of 39 countries for availability. Legal disputes have also skyrocketed since the 2017 changes, reaching 1,000 compared to just 33 tribunal cases between 1984 and 2017. Landowners can challenge the rent cost once the lease comes up for renewal, however the tribunal stage can be costly and off putting. Mr Glendinning added: 'Understandably, many now view the process as high-risk and low-reward, which has led to real difficulties in securing new sites. That, in turn, has had a catastrophic impact on mobile connectivity – particularly in rural areas and increasingly in urban settings too. 'The PSTI Act doubles down on this framework and there is a serious risk that the dysfunction we've already seen will only escalate. 'In cities like Glasgow and Edinburgh, where the pressures on property and infrastructure are already more acute, the burden placed on landlord is often far greater – and without meaningful reform, it's hard to see how the necessary collaboration can be restored.' A DSIT spokesperson said: 'Our priority is to continue delivering high quality 5G networks across the UK, which is critical to boosting growth and improving public services for the British people.'
The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘He left us with nothing': the British investors swindled by a German property firm
'He took everything, left us with absolutely nothing,' says David Middleton, one of thousands of British and Irish investors who racked up huge losses from the collapse of a German property ponzi scheme. The 72-year-old pensioner from Northern Ireland is referring to Charles Smethurst, the German-British businessman who set up Dolphin Capital in 2008, later renamed Dolphin Trust, then German Property Group (GPG), with 200 affiliated companies. In July 2020, the business filed for insolvency, owing more than €1bn to up to 25,000 investors around the world. Smethurst was convicted this month of 'serious fraud' and sentenced to six years and 11 months in prison by a regional court in Hildesheim, in northern Germany. As part of a plea bargain, he admitted to four of 27 counts of commercial fraud, filed against him by the Hanover public prosecutor's office last October, for total damages of €56m. The other charges were dropped in return for his confession to speed up the trial, which was due to run into August. Dolphin's glossy brochures promised readers double-digit returns for investing their money in a scheme that pledged to restore historic buildings across Germany – including the ruins of castle Dwasieden on the Baltic Sea island of Rügen – and turn them into luxury apartments. However, few were ever restored. Investors were mainly from the UK, Ireland, France, Singapore and South Korea and included financial institutions and individuals, many of whom lost their pension pots or other savings after regular interest payments dried up in 2019. Smethurst's fraud conviction related to €60m in investments made by the French fund manager Horizon AM, including €30m in the Pariser Strasse project in Berlin. The court heard that the building was never bought, but the funds were used by Smethurst's company to meet other obligations. He served a prison sentence for fraud between 2000 and 2003 in an unrelated case. Horizon said it was 'led to believe we were partnering with an experienced and reputable real estate developer' as Dolphin provided the firm with 'highly detailed due diligence documents' and sent regular reports wrongly suggesting projects were 'progressing as planned'. The investor was not aware of Smethurst's previous fraud conviction. 'According to findings from the insolvency administrator and the criminal investigation, a significant portion of the funds was diverted abroad to jurisdictions with strict banking secrecy, notably the British Virgin Islands and possibly the Cayman Islands,' Horizon said. 'These jurisdictions do not cooperate with European authorities, which means that the money trail goes cold. This illustrates the systemic failure of cross-border cooperation in cases of fraud, and why victims like us are left without meaningful recourse. 'We are still wondering where the money went, what remains, and whether it is still possible to recover anything to compensate Horizon and its investors.' UK individual investors told the Guardian they are angry, and fear that Smethurst will be released early for good conduct and recover the hidden funds for himself. Middleton and his wife, Janet, invested in Dolphin in 2015: his pension lump sum of £100,000 and her inheritance of £120,000. Their financial adviser, the late Alastair Hooks, told them it was low-risk and supported by the German government, Janet Middleton recalls. 'To be honest, I was nervous about it and strongly stated that as pensioners we could not afford to lose this amount of money, but again we were assured there was no risk.' After Dolphin filed for insolvency, Hooks did not return their calls, and the couple discovered he had unregistered from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in 2012. She says they have explored every avenue – even as they dealt with David being diagnosed with bowel cancer – but have not recovered any of their investment. Janet says Smethurst's sentence 'seems very lenient to me … Smethurst may well serve his sentence and even get early release for good behaviour while other people like David and I now serve a sentence in our retirement economically'. A former NHS nurse, she says the couple had been looking forward to a comfortable retirement but have had to budget their outgoings; they have not had a holiday in years and both drive 20-year-old cars. The Hildesheim court said it did not order Smethurst to make any payments to investors because it could not establish that he had personally siphoned off any funds. Justus von Buchwaldt, of the law firm BBL, the insolvency administrator who testified in June, subsequently said: 'I fear that this is only the tip of the iceberg. It is still unclear if other people were involved in this large-scale fraud and where most of the investments ended up.' Of an estimated €1.3bn of investments received by the property company, about €800m is missing. The Hanover prosecutor's office said it had investigated other company officials but could not find evidence of any wrongdoing. Sign up to Business Today Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning after newsletter promotion It is one of Germany's biggest investment scandals since the second world war, and the German authorities have been criticised for being slow to intervene, even though the property company stopped filing financial accounts in 2015. Alison Moncrieff-Kelly, 63, a freelance musician from Kent and former director of the Rye arts festival, was a Dolphin investor. She said: 'This seems a pathetically small price for Smethurst to pay for such heinous and convoluted levels of crime. Where's the money gone is the big question … and six years 11 months doesn't touch the sides.' Most of the listed buildings acquired by GPG were never redeveloped and left derelict. Von Buchwaldt at BBL has sold 20 of 75 properties so far, for more than €87m, and has yet to distribute the proceeds to investors. Those sold include castle Dwasieden, a listed former brewery in Bad Aibling in Bavaria and a period villa in Fürstenberg/Havel in Brandenburg. The property sales are expected to take years as the legal situation is often complex. Almost 8,000 creditors have filed claims with BBL against the collapsed property group, out of an estimated 15,000 to 25,000 investors globally. Von Buchwaldt has said BBL would work with the UK's FCA, Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). Debbie Kay Randles, 67, invested £25,000 in Dolphin in 2015 and, like others, has also lost money in other investment schemes. She paid £6,000 to a financial claims company in an attempt to recover her Dolphin investment, but 'they just disappeared'. She even enlisted a private detective to track down the claims firm. 'It's just been an absolute ongoing nightmare,' she says. 'I've not got a lot left, so I'll just keep working, probably until I'm 75, and then retire.' A former TSB employee, she now works for a window blinds business and lives in York. Moncrieff-Kelly says the trial 'doesn't address this issue of how incredibly badly regulated financial affairs are in the UK … I don't know if it's happening so much in any other country in the world.' She points to the 'middlemen' – financial advisers who are typically paid commission of 20% to 30% and 'kept that money' despite 'selling a fraud'. She invested in Dolphin after her financial adviser suggested it. Moncrieff-Kelly has recovered about half her £80,000 investment – money she inherited from her late mother – from the FSCS, with the help of a claims company that took the other half as payment. The FSCS says it has paid compensation to more than 1,900 customers in relation to Dolphin/GPG investment products, and a further 150 people have open claims. Compensation may have been triggered in relation to unsuitable financial advice that customers were given. It says it cannot put a figure on the compensation paid because it includes payouts for other investment losses. The SFO declined to comment while the FCA said it could not comment on individual firms. 'People don't understand the trauma and the damage that [fraud] has done,' says David Middleton. 'People think [with] white collar crime, slick City crime, there's no victim. There is a victim.'
Daily Mail
4 hours ago
- Daily Mail
How the future of the Right is being shaped... over exquisite lunches at London's most exclusive clubs
The future of Right-wing politics in Britain is being decided on the cigar terraces of Mayfair. As the opinion poll surge of Nigel Farage 's Reform UK shakes the foundations of the Conservatives, power-brokers from both parties are cutting deals and war-gaming defections on adjoining tables in the capital's most salubrious salons. The Tories have been described as the most successful political party in the world, on the back of 200 years of near-electoral dominance. But if leader Kemi Badenoch is going to maintain that reputation until the next election, it will require a revival of Lazarus-like dimensions. According to a YouGov poll last week, Mr Farage would win 271 seats if an election were held now – well ahead of Labour on 178. The Conservatives would trail the Liberal Democrats on a dismal rump of just 48 seats. It has led to long, dark nights of the soul for Tory grandees and donors: do they stick with the Conservatives, even if they are sleepwalking to electoral doom? Do they try to form a pact with Mr Farage? Or do they just jump ship completely? The result has been a series of lunches and dinners in ultra-exclusive clubs such as 5 Hertford Street and its sister institution Oswald's, both owned by entrepreneur Robin Birley. Oswald's, which is frequented by the likes of the Prince of Wales, Tony Blair, Boris Johnson and the Beckhams, was the venue for a splashy £1 million fundraising event for Reform earlier this year. And on a single day this month, the same lunch service at Oswald's boasted former prime minister David Cameron, his ex-chancellor George Osborne and Tory leadership hopeful Robert Jenrick all dining together, next to Mr Farage and his treasurer Nick Candy in deep conversation on a nearby table – and with former Tory Cabinet minister Jacob Rees-Mogg, who has urged the two parties to form a pact, offering greetings from a third table. In the same week, a short walk across Berkley Square at 5 Hertford Street, popular with Eurocrats and stars such as Hugh Grant, a single lunch sitting offered the spectacle of billionaire Michael Spencer, Lord Cameron's former treasurer, dining with Francis Maude, an ex-Tory chairman, under the watchful eyes of Mr Farage's inner circle, including Arron Banks and Andy Wigmore – the self-styled 'bad boys of Brexit' who helped fund Mr Farage's Brexit campaign in the 2016 referendum – and Mr Farage's mysterious fixer, 'Posh' George Cottrell. As the wine flowed – full-bodied red for the Tories, chablis for the Faragistes – it represented a neat microcosm of the shifting tectonic plates: Lord Maude – tipped to return to the chairman role – is understood to have been lobbying Lord Spencer for funds for the party, while the Faragistes were drawing up a list of Tory donors to target for defection. At the centre of this venn diagram of plotting is Mr Jenrick, who is more open than Mrs Badenoch to cutting a deal with Reform – and is said to have received Lord Cameron's backing to succeed her as leader. Meanwhile, at The In & Out private members' club, a more traditional Armed Forces venue situated at the other end of Piccadilly, allies of Mr Farage and Mr Jenrick have met for informal discussions about 'uniting the Right'. Conspirators have even floated the idea of Mr Jenrick acting as chancellor in a Farage administration, although both sides furiously deny any such plans. Mr Jenrick has also lunched at 5 Hertford Street with Rupert Lowe, the Great Yarmouth MP who lost the Reform whip after a spectacular bust-up with Mr Farage. Even many moderate Conservatives, facing the loss of their seats, are now considering a merger. One member of the Leftish One Nation group said: 'A pact with Reform is inevitable now.' The MP added: 'There should be a non-aggression pact where we agree to not stand in the five seats Reform already have, and we let Nigel take his pick of seats where he is coming second to Labour. And Reform would stand down in seats we are more likely to win. 'It would end up giving them the North to save the Home Counties.' An insider said Tory leader Mrs Badenoch 'would not be able to do the deal' but added that the timing had to be right for her successor to do so. The source said: 'At the moment there no point doing any type of deal because Reform is on a high. Labour has imploded too early – all the benefit is going to Reform. Kemi isn't nimble enough to capitalise on it.' Mrs Badenoch is continuing to pursue a 'slow and steady' approach, and regularly speaks to Lord Maude. 'He tells her to be patient and give the public the chance to come around,' the source said. Even Mrs Badenoch's most vociferous critics say a leadership challenge is unlikely in the near future. Says one: 'She's 99 per cent safe until May. 'No one will want to own the next disaster – and there are a number coming down the line.'
