Adding a European dimension

The Association of Private Client Investment Managers and Stockbrokers, to give it its Sunday name, whose previous chief executive, Angela Knight, recently departed to head up the British Bankers Association, wanted an operator with significant experience of the Brussels paper-machine to replace her.

Bennett undoubtedly has the credentials. He was head of the City of London Corporation's European Office for the past two years and previously had a long history in public affairs, so knows all about negotiating the corridors of power from the Bank of England and Treasury to the DTI and Cabinet Office.

His varied appointments include being director of public affairs at Eurofi, and then at leading City consultancy Citigate.

Back in the 1970s, Bennett did a two-year stint with the EC as a temporary administrator on the GATT talks - as well as standing as a Lib-Dem candidate in European elections in 1984.

Leading Scottish financial lights will get their first chance to see him in his new guise when he flies up to see them in Edinburgh on Friday, 16 February.

However, he is well-known to many of them already. One familiar face will be John Hall, chief executive of Brewin Dolphin Securities, which trades as Bell Lawrie in Scotland. Hall is also APCIMS' chairman.

"I also know Amanda, having worked alongside her at times in Brussels," Bennett says, referring to Amanda Harvie, chief executive of Scottish Financial Enterprise. The Scottish Executive office was above Bennett's office in Brussels.

His predecessor, Knight, was an effective head of APCIMS, sometimes with a machine-gun delivery to try and influence media opinion.

Jamie Matheson, executive chairman of Brewin Dolphin Holdings, said: "We expect David Bennett will have a different style. One of his real strengths will be his great experience and expertise in Brussels where we think much of our important lobbying as an association will be done."

Bennett, aged 58, also accepts his style will be different from Knight's on myriad EC issues, from the takeover and transport directives to stock market clearance and settlement systems and the market in financial instruments directive.

But he says people should not believe he is desperately emollient.

Speaking in his office in the City, Bennett says: "I'm not scared of controversy. Sometimes it helps to be below the parapet in public policy discussions.

"But there are other times you need to be in the media. I won't be afraid of doing that in the slightest."

But, perhaps tellingly for a former Brussels mandarin, he adds: "You have to judge who you are trying to persuade on an issue and what is going to move opinion-formers to accept your argument."

Asked about his first priorities at his new job, he says: "APCIMS is an organisation that has punched well above its weight - in policy discussions affecting financial services - and I will look to build on that.

"In my first hundred days, my aim is to get to know the membership, the structure, the various boards and working committees. There is a lot to get on top of before deciding targets and objectives."

This will suit him, he says, because he describes himself as "more big picture than fine detail, so I aim to draw a lot on the great technical expertise at APCIMS".

The new man says he is "collegiate" in approach, and as if to testify to the fact he invites his deputy, Guy Sears, to sit in on our talk.

Both seem to get on well and there is an amusing moment when Bennett says his new job and two young children mean he will not have the time he wishes to indulge his love of going to the opera.

With a knowing allusion to his boss's Brussels background, Sears chips in: "You've probably had enough of screaming Italians anyway."

Bennett acknowledges that his knowledge of the European Commission was pivotal in his appointment.

He sees one of his main jobs as "anticipating embryonic legislation" that could undermine innovation at APCIMS's member firms, and says 90 per cent of that now comes from the EC. He expects to be in Brussels at least three times a month.

An old hand, Bennett is candid about the problems of dealing with Brussels initiative-itis.

"If you look at the EC you can see what is coming. But it is what comes from the flanks that is the problem, what you are not expecting because things are amended for political reasons."

The new man raises his eyebrows and cites the European Central Bank recently suggesting a settlement system in the trading of stocks and shares for the whole of the eurozone - a bit like the bank's one-size-fits-all interest rate policy.

"It would be like the nationalisation of settlement, and although it is early days, it is quite threatening for some of our members like Euroclear," Bennett says.

"If a system comes into place that was rigidly for the eurozone it could fragment the settlement systems that people use at the moment, encourage inefficiency and upset investment plans."

APCIMS has already had one consultation on the ECB on the issue and a second one is slated for February.

Bennett identifies another problem of dealing with the Brussels paper-avalanche as the bloated gestation periods for change.

It can often take between three and seven years for a piece of financial or business legislation to traverse the labyrinthine talking shop of 27 countries, he says.

With just a hint of PG Wodehouse, Bennett says: "Very messy, thousands of eyes looking at it and a long time to bed things down.

"That's off the page for most in the media and politics. How do you keep people interested in the issue?"

He will also oversee APCIMS's relations with Britain's Financial Services Authority (FSA).

He is diplomatic currently on a widespread feeling among APCIMS's membership that while the British financial regulator's relations with big firms have got better there is still much work to do with smaller firms.

One gripe has been that while big financial firms have a direct FSA supervisor, the smaller firms that APCIMS represents often have to do with a helpdesk. The fact that these helpdesks also have to deal with non-APCIMS issues like mortgage and insurance mediation is not seen as strikingly helpful. Reciting the mantra of virtually all City practitioners, Bennett says he will strive for a light- touch principles-based approach from the FSA rather than a box-ticking prescriptive approach that might stifle the innovation of his members.

Away from the office? Apart from the opera, Bennett says he loves theatre and "swims a great deal".

However, he says the "different dimension" in his life is undoubtedly the physical and emotional joys and demands of having two young children, boys aged four and 15 months, relatively late in life.

They probably give him the perspective he needs after a day at the Brussels rockface.

DAVID BENNETT

Education: London University, BSc (Hons) Economics

Most recently read book: Enduring Love by Ian McEwan

Favourite recent film: Captain Corelli's Mandolin

Last holiday: Lake Garda, Italy

Car driven: Land Rover Freelander estate.