Can London be turned around like a troubled company?
Judi Bevan meets Tim Parker, the controversial private-equity player who slashed jobs and boosted value at Kwik-Fit and the AA, and is about to apply his skills at City Hall
Parker’s budget is £11.3 billion, including £6.8 billion for Transport for London and £3.5 billion for the Metropolitan Police, so City Hall is far from broke. But the aim is ‘to cut down the bureaucracy and use the money we save to do things at the front end’. With the current hot topic of knife crime in mind, ‘youth opportunity is high on Boris’s agenda. A lot of young people feel alienated, feel they have no stake in the system. We have to get money to the communities that can deliver services that will help.’
As a left-wing undergraduate reading PPE at Pembroke College, Oxford, Parker chaired the University Labour Club and enjoyed rubbing shoulders with guest speakers such as Tariq Ali and Michael Foot. ‘At one point I really thought you could plan the economy,’ he laughs incredulously.
His was a typical rebellion against an army childhood and public-school education. Born in Aldershot in 1955, Parker is the elder son of a distinguished officer who fought with Montgomery at El Alamein, winning a DCM for bravery. While growing up, Tim and his younger brother Andrew (who works for the World Bank) travelled with their parents to Malaysia and Germany. He has fond memories of the rubber plantation at the bottom of their garden in Malaysia. ‘Giving a child a couple of years away from the UK with a different language and culture is a wonderful thing to do,’ he says. ‘It makes them aware that this world is not the only world.’
At 11 he went to board at Abingdon School, where he was a bright all-rounder, rowed in the first eight, played the flute and made a group of friends who still meet several times a year.
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Simon Hall
July 17th, 2008 11:57amWell perhaps Tim Parker is not concerned about taxes that people in London have to pay but I am. The tax burden from local councils is unfairly high - it is time to review the way in which the blunt council tax is calculated.
Damian Hockney
July 17th, 2008 3:36pmThe new administration at City Hall talks about cutting costs but does not answer where the money is going to come from to do all the things it says need doing. Tim Parker may not be bothered at the ever increasing taxes in London, but a main plank of the Tory campaign was the 'unacceptable' massive increase in the Mayor's 'precept' over the previous 8 years. Are we in for even more? Cutting a few staff at City Hall is tokenistic and does not represent one tenth of one per cent of the whole budget.
D Short
July 18th, 2008 2:21amHow can this person claim that he's never heard people in London complain about tax, but then go on to talk about the 'hard-pressed' taxpayer?
Shome mishtake, shurely?