Barclays chairman's trusteeship at Kew to be reviewed in October

Civil Society | Vibeka Mair | 4 Jul 2012

The Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is to review the position of outgoing Barclays chairman Marcus Agius as chair of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, in October.

Marcus Agius has been chair of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew for two years. His appointment comes up for automatic review in October and the decision whether to axe or keep him as chair will be made by Caroline Spelman, Secretary of State at Defra, because the charity is an executive non-departmental public body sponsored by Defra.

In recent days Barclays has been engulfed in a political and public storm after it was fined £290m for fixing key interest rates.

Its chairman Marcus Agius announced his resignation from the bank on Monday. He will continue to run Barclays until a new chief executive is appointed.

Barclays' chief executive Bob Diamond quit his post yesterday but will still appear before the Treasury select committee this afternoon to answer questions about the rate-fixing scandal.

Diamond is a trustee of the Mayor’s Fund for London. A spokeswoman for the charity told civilsociety.co.uk that it had no plans to review his role.

Speaking to the Evening Standard yesterday, Mayor of London Boris Johnson offered strong support for Diamond, who has been a trustee of the charity which helps young Londoners since Johnson was first elected.

Johnson told the Evening Standard: “Bob Diamond has devoted enormous time, energy and philanthropic effort to the cause of helping young Londoners through the Mayor’s Fund. As far as I’m concerned that work is set to continue.”

Directory: Royal Botanic Gardens Kew

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