This week in Post: Scraps, slurs and sexual harassment
Post held its reputation event this week, which felt somewhat prescient as parts of the industry were shamed on diversity and inclusion.
In a week that it revealed a £1bn loss for 2018, Lloyd’s of London scrambled to release an action plan to create a “safe and inclusive” working environment, on the back of a Bloomberg Businessweek report last week in which one industry insider labelled the institution a “meat market”.
It wasn’t just Lloyd’s that made headlines for the wrong reasons.
Liberal Democrat leader and MP for Twickenham, Vince Cable wrote a letter to the boss of Premiership Rugby urging him to review the sport’s commercial relationship with Gallagher, after the broker’s UK CEO Simon Matson said his use of racist language – “complicated fat Arab” – to describe an outgoing employee in a private 2017 Whatsapp message was regrettable but not discriminatory.
Matson’s message was revealed in a bitter court battle over alleged poaching between Gallagher and Ardonagh, in which further correspondence between senior Gallagher figures painted a less than pretty picture.
Ardonagh denies its allegations in the ongoing suit. Its CEO David Ross took the stand this week. He denied the “implausible” allegation he tried to hire Matson.
Also in the news, a claimant sector trade body was launched, aiming to “detoxify the compensation culture”.
Citizens Advice Bureau warned the industry could face “heavy-handed” regulation should it fail to clean up its act on dual pricing.
In research, we published a special report into motor insurance.
In blogs this week, Airmic CEO John Ludlow shared his thoughts on becoming risk partners. Lexis Nexis’ Graham Gordon blogged on tackling distracted driving.
We took a look back at former winners of the major loss category at the British Insurance Awards, championing 25 years of going the extra mile.
Meanwhile, in the third episode of Claims Apprentice, the teams were tasked with coming up with their own diversity and inclusion initiatives. After events this week, it might be fair to say it’s even more of a must watch than usual for some.
Happy weekending.
Jen Frost, reporter
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