19-05-2025
Sir Graeme Odgers obituary: chair of Monopolies Commission
Graeme Odgers, a senior official at the Department of Trade and Industry, was chairing a meeting of leading British bankers in the boardroom of Barclays Bank. Across the table sat Alex Park, the chief executive of British Leyland, with the rest of his board. After an hour of tortured discussion, Odgers got to the heart of the problem: 'Mr Park, are you telling us that next week you may not be able to pay your employees' wages?' After a long silence, Park replied: 'Mr Odgers, I think I might be telling you that.'
It was 1975 and British Leyland not only employed 250,000 workers but also indirectly supported about 300,000 in associated companies, meaning that a sizeable proportion of the country's workforce faced imminent unemployment.
