Lord Stokes: Tough industrialist unfairly blamed for the failure of Leyland's merger with the...

Donald Stokes was chairman of the ill-fated British Leyland Motor Corporation from 1968 to 1975. He was unfairly blamed for the inevitable failure of the government-inspired attempt to bring together all the major British-owned motor companies in the British Leyland Motor Corporation in 1969, a task in which the greatest managerial genius could never have succeeded. Stokes, personally sensible, engaging, unassuming, unpretentious, was far tougher, far abler, than the picture of the "over-promoted bus salesman" painted by his enemies. He knew he was not a major intellect but, as he once told me: "Sure, the civil servants I deal with are more intelligent than I am but I've got that little bit of cunning they lack." In fact he was far more of a salesman and deal-maker than a manager capable of running a complex group. After... [read full story]