David Parkin on a shining light in stockbroking and why Carlos Tevez is offside

IF you want to find the antidote to the arrogant, champagne swilling prigs who buy and sell billions on City trading floors at the touch of a button but care nothing for other people, then step forward Keith Loudon.

Keith’s the senior partner of Yorkshire-based national stockbroker Redmayne-Bentley but is as far removed from the now ingrained image of a fat cat stocks and shares trader than you could find.

Plain-speaking, down-to-earth, honest and fair, he turns 80 on Monday and it is not hard to work out why he has enjoyed 57 years in the up and down world of the investment industry.

I called in to see him earlier this week and the conversation, rather than a gentle meander down memory lane, was more focused on the future, not just of his firm or his industry, but of the UK economy and the fortunes of Leeds and Yorkshire as well.

Keith first trained as a chartered accountant – interrupted by two years National Service with the York & Lancaster Regiment in the Sudan and Germany – before joining his father Gavin who had brought together three firms, FW Bentley, JW Grainger and Redmayne & Co.

He recalls arriving in Khartoum – scene of General Gordon’s last stand – and seeing a banner in the barracks store bearing the words: ‘Disperse or we fire’.

One of his office walls bears a huge image of the pedestrian bridge which crosses the River Aire between The Calls and Brewery Wharf.

“That’s my bridge,” he said proudly, referring to when he officially opened it during his year as Lord Mayor of Leeds.

As the conversation turned to the future, it was good to hear such a sage – perhaps he’s Yorkshire’s answer to Warren Buffett – profess confidence in an economic upturn.

Despite the predicted upturn, Mr Loudon still subscribes to the saying: ‘Sell in May and come back on St Leger Day’.

“My colleague Alan Collins will tell you that in 97 years out of 100 it is the right thing to do.”

And it is the unpredictability of life trading the markets, that keeps him stimulated and dismissing questions of retirement posed by daft young bucks like me.

“I find it stimulating. The market always is.”

The history of West Yorkshire is that stockbrokers live to a great age, he says, reeling off a string of brokers that worked well into their 80s. “My father worked until three weeks before the end. I plan to work for another decade.”

Happy Birthday Keith.

:::

If you go into a shop, cafe or office the length and breadth of Britain you are more than likely to meet someone working there who is foreign.

And despite the tabloid scaremongering, the vast majority of these immigrants work hard, learn the language, do their best to adapt to the culture and add value to a nation with a proud tradition of freedom and tolerance.

As an employer, if you take on a foreign worker, you would expect them to have a pretty good grasp of the English language.

That, it seems, applies in every workplace except professional football.

Manchester City striker Carlos Tevez has lived and worked in the UK for the last six years, playing for West Ham and Manchester United before joining his current employers where he earns an estimated £200,000 a week.

And yet, after six years of being paid a fortune and having nothing more to do than kick a ball each day while being mollycoddled and doted upon by a plethora of club officials, he doesn’t have a basic command of the English language.

Or so his lawyers suggested when he was convicted of his second driving ban in six months earlier this week.

I would suggest foreign workers with that bad a gap in their language skills would struggle to get a job in any other industry.

Tevez must now embark on 250 hours of community service which is likely to include litter-picking and gardening duties.

Let’s hope somebody is around to advise him if he ever has to use a weedkiller bearing the warning: ‘Danger. Do not swallow.’