WHO wants to have the tricky task of managing the taxpayers' holdings in Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds-HBOS, Bradford & Bingley and Northern Rock?

The Treasury is advertising for a successor to John Kingman as chief executive of UK Financial Investments, the quango set up last November after the spectacular banking bailouts. “A unique and vital role at the heart of the UK banking industry,” says the advertisement, which lists the credentials the candidate must have: “Exceptional financial acumen and strategic vision. Extensive financial services experience. Proven change manager. High level of intellect. Personal credibility, gravitas and authority to negotiate on highly complex and contentious issues with chairman/CEOs of investee banks, the investor community, and Cabinet-level ministers and senior civil servants. Politically astute. A confident, articulate and measured leader. First-rate interpersonal skills, with a diplomatic, collegiate and persuasive style.”
Phew. If it sounds like a nightmare, that's because it almost certainly is — even if the taxpayer is now just showing a paper profit on its RBS shares and is close to break-even on Lloyds. Is it any wonder that Kingman has quit UKFI?

City man, not mandarin, wanted

THE fact that the Treasury is advertising the UKFI job widely in the Sunday newspapers and that it wants someone with “extensive financial services experience” strongly suggests that it wants a City player — rather than just a talented Sir Humphrey like Kingman. That's another reason John Kingman, formerly the number two civil servant at the Treasury, is leaving UKFI. Paradoxically, he might be a better chief exec for UKFI in a few years' time when, as he is apparently planning, he has earned his millions in investment banking…

* COULD Astaire Securities, the company which received a rare public rebuke, as well as a £225,000 fine, by the LSE over the flotation of air conditioning specialist Worthington Nicholls, be stepping into hot water again? Back in June, it published an awfully strong buy note on Phorm, the maker of controversial software that monitors internet users to target them with adverts. The recommendation, written by Astaire's head of equities, Michael Armitage, was so strong, in fact, that it suggested a target price 250% higher than the 548p stock price at the time (the shares have since dipped to 185p). But what's this? Stefan Allesch-Taylor, a
non-executive director at Phorm, also happens to be chairman at Fairfax, the broker which acts as the nominated adviser for Astaire … Coincidence?

* GORDON Brown says the UK is the best-placed country to recover from recession. Why then are France, Germany and Japan all growing again while the slump carries on here? And why do the Netherlands, Austria, Cyprus, Denmark, Slovenia, Romania, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Bulgaria, Malta, Italy and Denmark all have lower unemployment than us?

* PROOF the “staycation” has been a flop: Online retailer Asos reports that fake tan sales are up 46% on last year as Brits left pale and pasty from their rainy holidays here try to compensate.

* CITY veteran Peter Hambro's son, Leo, seemed a tad nervous explaining why, as CEO of Russian Timber Group he used 1,400 North Korean loggers. Young Hambro said the contractor who supplied the loggers complied with Russian labour laws — but he couldn't control what they were paid. (It wasn't much to write home to Pyongyang about.) “There is always going to be criticism … of any involvement with North Korea, especially as its been flagged by people like President Obama as an axis of evil,” Hambro shakily offered in his defence. Lots of people are trying to forget George W Bush but that's going some, Leo.

Anarchists' ditties are no Byrd song

IT was good to see City Spy's favourite anarchist, Vestey meat-packing heir Mark Brown, back in the swing of things at Climate Camp on Blackheath.
The Radley-educated trustafarian rose to fame in 1999 when he was accused — and acquitted — of organising the City riots that led to violence and £2 million of damage when dozens of eco-protesters ran amok in the Square Mile.
Now, after successfully tweaking the noses of BP and Shell in recent years, he re-emerged from a period of what friends say is “intensive songwriting” to serenade fellow environmentalists at the Blackheath jamboree.
Accompanied by a harmonica and bongo drums, Brown, the irony-free grandson of Sir Derek Vestey, has been firing up the debate on globalisation and green issues with his own little ditty. It goes:”We're marching through the city, no, no we're dancing through the city, we dance.”
Brilliant. Mark, City Spy recommends your not giving up the day job — if you had one.

* NO surprise to see hordes of Climate Campers demonstrating against Rio Tinto, Shell, BP, Eon and all those other big polluters. But one on the hitlist is bizarre. Point Carbon is a monitoring and research outfit set up by Norwegian ex-hippies to report on and forecast the carbon market. It doesn't trade carbon, it doesn't create carbon — well, no more than any other small organisation. But nonetheless, Climate Camp has it in its sights. Some mistake, no?

It's eco-confusion at M&S

HAVE Marks & Spencer's staff properly got the hang of the retailer's environmentally aware Plan A? City Spy's shopper in the Food Hall tells how she splashed out £2.50 on a Twiggy “organic cotton” carrier bag so she could carry off her small number of groceries — only for the helpful till assistant to pack everything, including the eco-bag, into a good old-fashioned M&S plastic carrier.