On the money with Gavin Hinks

First Jock Lennox, the man who would be king (he failed in his bid against Mark Otty to win leadership of the firm) leaves for early retirement, and now we learn the firm’s UK head of tax, Paul Davies has accepted a position as partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Moves likes the Davies one are quite rare. If you manage to make a senior position like leading a service line in a Big Four firm, you tend to stick around for the rest of your career before either taking a cushy portfolio position, becoming an FD of some lauded FTSE250 outfit with good prospects or taking a comfy pension-building role at a regulator. Rarely do you want to defect so much you take what, on the face of it, looks like a lesser role at the opposition.

Actually, being a partner is being a partner ­ regardless of whether you head a service line or not ­ so the move shouldn’t really be a step down. But it can sometimes be a bit like turning your back on family.

What observers will be asking is whether the two departures (both slated for next year in one way or another) are an indication of more widespread disaffection among E&Y partners.

It’s entirely possible that there is some unhappiness with the direction that the firm has taken in bringing 87 national businesses under the management of a single board run by Otty.

It’s also worth noting that, while the firm is number two in the US, the business seems to be slipping behind the top two firms in the UK, which turn over £2bn annually while E&Y does £1.4bn. Of course, that’s no small number, but the difference speaks of a competitive disadvantage.

Davies said he wanted to work at the leading tax practice in the UK and globally. Clearly he didn’t think it was E&Y.

Gavin Hinks is editor of Accountancy Age