The chief executive of Standard Life's life and pensions business has been forced to apologise for publicly using the phrase "nigger in the woodpile".
As 600 of the insurer's staff queued to attend recruiting meetings staged by trade union Amicus, in response to the proposed closure of the non-unionised company's highly-valued final-salary scheme, the union revealed a formal complaint had been made about the blunder.
It came as Trevor Matthews, a breezy Australian brought in to shake up the company in 2004 and viewed as favourite to succeed Sandy Crombie as group chief executive, was giving the company's key presentation about its pension proposals earlier this week.
Asked why the proposed cut had been buried on page 126 of last year's huge formal prospectus on demutualisation, Mr Matthews said: "That's the nigger in the woodpile." A formal complaint was made to the company, understood to be from a white member of staff who has a black spouse.
Willie Gibson, regional financial officer at Amicus, said: "If this is true it is an absolute scandal. Remarks of that nature are not welcome in any walk of life, let alone at presentations of an insurance company."
Matthews said last night: "It was a terrible mistake by me, I am very upset about it and I deeply apologise. It was a phrase that was common in my childhood, I don't know how it slipped out, and as soon as it did I was sorry. Anyone who knows me knows I am certainly not a racist, I am completely the opposite. I believe in the equality of the human spirit. I have never said it before in a public forum and I will certainly never say it again."
Mr Matthews said he would be apologising to the individual who complained, and in his weekly message to staff tomorrow.
Standard Life insisted afterwards the plans to move existing members of the final-salary scheme on to a "career average" basis had been thoroughly consulted on. But the company said it would consider any approach from Amicus which "might lead to further discussions".
Mr Matthews said: "The full import of what was happening only became visible to people when the proposals came out. The important issue now is to try to communicate the changes."
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