Duncan MacLeod

Born: November 1, 1934; Died: November 4, 2014

Duncan MacLeod, who has died aged 80, was a prominent member of the Glasgow business community, having served on the boards of the Bank of Scotland, The Weir Group, Motherwell Bridge, British Caledonian Airways and Scottish Provident.

He became a partner of Brown, Fleming and Murray, subsequently Whinney Murray, in 1960 and continued to be a senior member of the firm as it grew through merger, eventually retiring from Ernst & Whinney in 1989, having been managing partner of the Glasgow office, prior to its merger with Arthur Young.

Colleagues in the accountancy firm and in the companies on whose boards he served always valued his strong intellect, steady advice and his tendency to always ask the critical questions.

One long-time colleague described him as the go-to man; whenever a partner was confronted with a particularly difficult situation, he would consult Mr MacLeod who always had a solution. "It was not necessarily what you wanted to hear, but you knew it was right" and herein lay one of his great attributes in business or indeed other aspects of his life, which was that he never shirked from dealing with a difficult situation and was always willing and ready to dispense advice.

Often, he would use his sharp sense of humour and his mastery of the one liner to defuse these difficult situations or release a logjam. Above all, he was respected and admired from the bottom of the firm to the top for the way he dealt with all members of staff.

As well as his more high-profile business roles, he was a trusted advisor to many Scottish family companies and estates.

He was created CBE in 1984 as a result of his membership of and contribution to the Scottish Industrial Development and Advisory Board and was made an honorary fellow of Stirling University as a result of his fund raising efforts for the Dementia Services Development Centre, which is housed in the Iris Murdoch Building on the campus of the university. He was also Scottish treasurer of the Mental Health Foundation where he further demonstrated his ability to raise significant funds for good causes.

Having retired from Ernst & Whinney, he continued to exercise his considerable skills by lodging, on behalf of the descendants of his maternal grandfather, John Julius Jersey de Knoop and others, the UK's second largest claim against the Russian Government for British assets seized in the Bolshevik revolution. The family company, de Jersey and co, which had several cotton mills in Russia, went bankrupt in 1932. The claim involved having de Jersey restored to the register, a full liquidation being carried out, creditors repaid (who had long given up on the debt) and surplus assets being distributed to descendants, including six figure sums to pleasantly surprised relations in Bogota.

He was born in Edinburgh, the eldest son of Alan MacLeod and grandson of Duncan MacLeod of Skeabost, who made his fortune in the whisky business with Duncan MacLeod & Co. He maintained the family connection with Skye as chieftain of the Glasgow Skye Association and chairman of MacLeod Hotels, the last remaining part of his grandfather's extensive business interests.

He was educated at Eton where he contracted polio from swimming in the River Thames and, as a result of this, was excused national service and went straight into accountancy practice.

In 1958 he married Joanna Bibby with whom he had three children. Sadly, Joanna died in 2007 as a result of contracting Alzheimer's disease. Her husband cared for her throughout her long illness and the way that he dealt with this setback, as well as others that affected his life, drew great admiration from friends and colleagues. As the grip of dementia tightened around Joanna, a dependency on alcohol overwhelmed him. But he turned disaster into triumph by becoming a trusted counsellor to other victims of alcoholism for the rest of his life.

He married Margaret Lewis (nee Galbraith)in 2011, who brought him much love and support as his health declined, but they kept active and social and enjoyed many trips abroad to South Africa, Portugal and Australia, where one of his sons lives with his family.

He was a fanatical golfer, being a lifelong member of Prestwick, where he was captain in 1998, and of the R&A. It was advisable for non-golfing members of his family not to visit during important tournaments as his attention rarely strayed from the television during The Open or The Masters.

An important part of family life was the annual visit to Arran where children and grandchildren went through the rites of passage of stalking their first stag, pulling the lobster pots and taking on a competitive grandad at golf and bridge.

He had a wide circle of friends throughout the United Kingdom who will remember him for his unfailing kindness and his generosity of spirit. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2008, and even though the cancer quickly spread, he refused to allow it to affect his life

He is survived by his widow, Maggie, three children, a stepson and seven grandchildren.