ROYAL Bank of Scotland has appointed a veteran of its corporate banking business to be the new head of the taxpayer-owned group’s operations in Scotland.
Edinburgh-based RBS said Malcolm Buchanan, managing director of corporate and commercial banking in Scotland, has succeeded Ken Barclay as chairman of its board in the country.
Mr Buchanan said he was honoured to be appointed to a position in which he will play a key role in Royal Bank’s efforts to overcome the legacy of the problems the group has suffered since requiring a £45 billion bail out from taxpayers in 2008.
As chairman of the Scotland board Mr Buchanan will head a body that is meant to ensure all the different parts of the RBS business in Scotland are working together effectively.
Royal Bank said Mr Buchanan will drive the board’s strategy to build a successful and sustainable RBS in Scotland and to help the bank become number one for customer service and trust in the country.
“I want to play my part in making RBS the bank of choice for people in Scotland by rebuilding trust with our customers and by focussing resolutely on becoming number one for customer service in the country,” said Mr Buchanan.
Last month Ross McEwan, the chief executive of RBS, said there is still a lot of work to do to return the group to health as it counts the financial and reputational cost of issues such as payment protection insurance mis-selling.
As one of the dominant players in Scotland, Royal Bank faces competition from rivals lenders such as HSBC that see opportunities to increase their market share.
Mr Buchanan has been appointed three months after Mr Barclay surprised the market by announcing he intended to leave Royal Bank of Scotland after almost 40 years with the group. One of the best known business bankers in Scotland, Mr Barclay spent the last three years as chairman of the RBS Scotland board.
It is thought Mr Barclay wanted to consider other possibilities following a long career at RBS. This included spells running Royal Bank’s corporate banking business in Asia Pacific and creating and leading the Technology, Media and Telecoms banking business in the UK and continental Europe.
Mr Buchanan has gained over 20 years of business banking involving big corporates and smaller firms, working in Scotland, Manchester and London.
A Chartered Banker by training, Mr Buchanan joined RBS in 2000 after the group bought NatWest, where he had been working for two years. He previously spent 13 years at Clydesdale Bank.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here