market talk
Ex-BIBA man joins Devitt Ring recovery story
Staddon joins Devitt C
hartered insurance broker Peter Staddon joined Devitt Insurance Brokers in October 2011 as technical director. The former BIBA man started his insurance career in 1971, working his way through the various classes of
commercial business. But for the last 15 years he worked for the British Insurance Brokers’
Association where he led the technical team. Peter tells me his BIBA role involved sitting on the GEO (Government Equalities Office) working party that
looked at the implications of the Equalities Act and the European equivalent the Equal Treatment Directive. “I had executive responsibility for the technical committees, and participated in industry working groups which drew up a section of the Code of Practice for Contract Certainty and a new code for the handling of healthcare insurance products. I also took responsibility for the creation and negotiation with insurers on the various BIBA insurance schemes for members.
know she won’t mind me saying so, but sometimes it’s easy to forget that Ecclesiastical’s fine art underwriting manager Clare Pardy is a member of the ‘insurance people’ fraternity - as indeed she is. It’s just that when she is a host at one of the many magnificent edifices that the heritage insurer has on its portfolio, you forget all about
Return of the Ring I
in association with
“There was also a ‘trouble shooting’ role in disputes between brokers, intermediaries, their clients and insurers. I worked with the HMRC and Treasury on questions around the higher insurance premium taxation charged for insurance policies bought by travel agents in accordance with EU regulations, and I engaged with the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) on trade credit as well as brokers’ succession plans.” For the future Peter Staddon will be tasked with
Peter Staddon
developing and expanding Devitt’s profile within the insurance industry, with a view to creating new growth opportunities and
distribution channels, and to oversee the regulatory and compliance activities.
insurance. Her knowledge and enthusiasm for fine art is highly infectious. She recently related the story of the recovery of a gold ring stolen from the home of the most senior member of the Church of Scotland. A mysterious hand-written, unfranked envelope arrived nine months later containing the ring’s amethyst stone. “Sounds like the
beginning of a new Dan Brown novel, doesn’t it?” says Clare. “No, it’s actually the conclusion of one of Ecclesiastical’s most intriguing heritage insurance claims of recent years.”
Clare Pardy 8 insurancepeople NOVEMBER 2011
On Christmas Eve 2010, the Helensburgh home of the Moderator of
The Moderator’s ring stone
the Church of Scotland, the Right Reverend John Christie, was broken into and a number of valuable items stolen. Among them was the Moderator’s ceremonial gold and amethyst ring, which has been passed on for a century, from one Moderator to the next. Rewards were posted, but just as hope of
recovery was fading, the ring’s amethyst stone appeared in its mysterious envelope through the Moderator’s letterbox in Edinburgh. Clare Pardy: “It’s enormously satisfying when we are able to recover important historic artefacts like this - the monetary value is almost irrelevant. What matters to the customer and to us is the restoration of a long- standing tradition. Even though the ring’s gold band has not been returned, we will reset the stone into a new, but identical, band so that it can be returned to the Moderator to play its traditional role in the Church of Scotland’s ceremonies.”
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