The Capitalist: Paddington Bear’s politics, buildings with phallic names and RIP the pumpkin spice latte

Corporate echo chambers, controversial buildings with phallic names, Paddington Bear’s true political persuasions and the end of the pumpkin spice latte? Catch up on the latest City gossip in this week’s edition of The Capitalist

WORKING SMARTER NOT HARDER

We’ve all been there; you’ve got work to do but two hours of your diary are booked out for mandatory training videos. You know the type – GDPR training, data security, HR policies, employment law updates, the list goes on. All very sensible, some might say, but over in the US some enterprising employees at accountancy giant EY thought they’d do their bit for productivity by watching multiple videos at once. Most training schemes only log you as having completed the task once the full video finishes, so this may have seemed like a bright idea. Bosses thought otherwise, and fired them for breaching the firm’s values of “integrity and ethics”. It’s not surprising EY takes this seriously; two years ago the SEC fined them $100m after discovering that “a significant number of EY audit professionals cheated” – on the ethics component – of professional exams.

PUFFED-UP POLITICOS

Politics is big business, and that’s true whether Labour or the Tories are in power. Any lobby shop or PR firm worth their salt has long-since snapped up former members of a Labour regional policy sub committee, in order to show off their links with the new government. Arden Strategies goes one better, with Labour bigwig Jim Murphy serving as CEO. A few weeks ago, Politico ran a story about Murphy allegedly inviting his clients to a “private roundtable meeting” at the Treasury. The Tories sensed blood in the water, with Laura Trott demanding answers from Treasury top brass about this apparent blurring of the lines. Top civil servant James Bowler has since replied, confirming that “lobbying firms are not permitted to organise meetings in the Treasury” – and, according to a Politico update, make it clear that Arden Strategies have never done so. So, was it a case of Murphy over-selling his influence to clients? He wouldn’t be the first lobbyist to do that.

CONSULTO, ERGO SUM

Speaking of professional services, a staffer at one of “the Big Four” has undergone some kind of existential soul-searching and, helpfully for The Capitalist, shared his musings about the services they sell in a Reddit post. He confesses: “I can’t shake the feeling that it’s all just a bunch of fairy dust… where the f**k is the actual substance?” He goes on to ask, presumably rhetorically, “how much of this consulting game is about truly helping companies versus just tossing more buzzwords into the corporate echo chamber?” Gaze into the corporate echo chamber, and the corporate echo chamber will gaze back into you.

SHOT OF INSPIRATION

The new Starbucks boss, Brian Niccol, has been putting his 1,000 mile private jet commute to good use, coming up with ideas to save the company. Top of the list is “simplifying the complex menu” – which will be welcome news to anyone who wants a cup of coffee but is instead bombarded with monstrous syrup-fuelled novelty concoctions. He’s also pledged to “fix our pricing architecture” – which may or may not mean making things cheaper.

PADDINGTON BEAR-EAUCRACY     

Online discourse around immigration is fraught at the best of times, but it’s an unlikely figure that’s taken the brunt of it this week: Paddington Bear. The marmalade-loving, bespectacled creature has found himself in the spotlight after it was revealed this week by Paddington 3 co-producer Rob Silva that the beloved bear, who hails from the jungles of “darkest Peru”, had been issued with an official UK passport by the Home Office. He said the government had gone above and beyond when asked to provide a replica to be used as a prop in the movie. While likely intended as a cute stunt, not everyone has found the move so endearing, with some suggesting the Home Office – currently battling a fresh backlog of asylum claims reportedly due to errors caused from a previous rush to clear the backlog – may not be correctly prioritising its resources.

But it’s not the first brush with politics for the Peruvian bear, whose iconography has been capitalised on by pro-immigration activists in the past due to his fictional status as a refugee. Conversely, Paddington’s 2022 collaboration with Queen Elizabeth II has also been interpreted by some as a divulsion of the bear’s conservative, pro-monarchy agenda. When contacted to confirm whether Paddington was pro-establishment, Harper Collins, who own the publishing rights to Paddington Bear, did not respond. 

REVOLUT X CHARLIE XCX

360 party girls move over, it’s fintech bros that are now capturing the attention of Charli XCX, with challenger bank Revolut this week announcing the Brat superstar would be headlining an exclusive Revolut-customer festival in celebration of the company reaching 50m global users. The fintech, notable for (among other things) some concern over an “aggressive” company culture and – more recently – for being named in more fraud complaints than any other major UK bank, may well embody the rules-don’t-apply-to-me attitude of Brat Girl Summer.

FUNNY NAME, NEW PROPOSAL

Light shards reflected from the Walkie Talkie melted high-performance cars when it launched in 2013, and some architects argued the Shard destroyed the historical identity of the city. Skyscrapers are always controversial, but especially 1 Undershaft, a new building for the City planned to be as tall as the Shard. After Lloyd’s of London complained the project would “rob the City of a really important convening space” and Historic England said the plans “seriously degrade the scale and character” of lunch spot St Helen’s Square, developers resubmitted plans this week with a ground-floor redesign and public garden on the 11th floor. Sharing the new look on Linkedin, one architecture journalist questioned whether the revisions will “be enough” to silence the critics. The name certainly won’t: ‘undershaft’ has already had multiple people in stitches on social media. As for Lloyd’s of London, they declined to comment when The Capitalist approached them about the new plans. A lesson that bigger isn’t always better.