Following its split from Lloyds, TSB Bank has announced the appointment of former Post Office general counsel (GC) Susan Crichton as its new legal chief, leading the newly separated bank’s legal function in the New Year as it moves towards an initial public offering (IPO).
Crichton played a key role in the Post Office’s separation from Royal Mail, before which she was legal, governance and risk director at Skandia International between 2008 and 2010, and GC at General Electric (GE) Money and Consumer Finance between 1999 and 2008.
Commenting on her appointment, chief executive of TSB, Paul Pester said: ‘I am delighted to welcome Susan to TSB. Susan has extensive experience in financial services and her knowledge will be invaluable to us as we move TSB towards floatation and beyond.’
Crichton said: ‘It’s an exciting time to be joining Britain’s newest bank. With its focus on local banking, TSB offers something quite different to UK customers and I look forward to working with the team to support and contribute to the bank’s ongoing success.’
Former Financial Services Authority (FSA) legal chief Andrew Whittaker was appointed to head Lloyds’ legal team last December.
TSB first opened in the early 1800s as Trustee Savings Bank and merged with Lloyds in 1995, with the latter owning 70pc of the equity. As a condition of the government’s bail-out of the bank, now 39%-owned by the taxpayer, Lloyds was ordered to sell 631 branches in a plan known as Project Verde.
The appointment comes after Mercedes-Benz UK hired PSA Peugeot Citroen’s head of legal and company secretary Jonathan Lipman as its new GC and compliance officer after former legal chief Iain Larkins left the role to found virtual commercial firm Radius Law.
Prior to Peugeot, Lipman was first counsel and company secretary of German chemicals company Evonik Degussa between 2004 and 2007, having also worked at the British Standards Institution (BSI).
francesca.fanshawe@legalease.co.uk
