Doing yourself some credit (From Bournemouth Echo)

Doing yourself some credit

7:03pm Tuesday 7th October 2008 in

• Skip social links
• Print
• Email
•  

Back in the '70s, Prime Minister Edward Heath coined one of that decade's most famous phrases to describe the business activities of entrepreneur Tiny Rowland and his Lonhro Group. Rowland was, said Heath, "the unacceptable face of capitalism".

We saw the latest unacceptable face of capitalism on our television screens on Monday night, and boy, it wasn't pretty.

Conservationists and animal lovers in general will doubtless be upset at the description of Dick Fuhd as "the Gorilla of Greed".

Fuhd is the super-rich banker who was boss of Lehman Brothers until it collapsed last month, helping to accelerate the global financial meltdown. Under his control, the company invested increasingly in the high-risk sector of the US mortgage market and came crashing down as a result. He earned his nickname from tough talking and a bad temper, and there'd surely be more than a touch of schadenfreude over his downfall, except he's still worth half a billion dollars, and most of us have been taken down with him to some degree or other.

At the other end of the spectrum sits James Benamor, the self-made multi- millionaire and chief executive of the Richmond Group in Bournemouth.

Modest to the point of appearing shy, quiet and unassuming and keen to help charities like the Youth Cancer Trust, Benamor was featured on The Secret Millionaire. You can judge him for yourself by reading his profile elsewhere on this website. You might also consider his business ethos.

"Our responsibility is to only lend to people who can afford the repayments."

Now there's a revolutionary idea...