True conservatives, in the broad, non-party-affiliated sense of the word, are increasingly rare these days, and City grandee Sir Mike Rake is a staunch defender of the status quo. From deploring polarisation in UK politics to the state of European investment banking, the serial chair’s values seem at odds not with a particular philosophy, but with sweeping change itself.

At Barclays, the UK bank where Rake was deputy chair in the early part of the decade, he and others on the board moved to oust its then-chief executive Antony Jenkins in 2015 for having the temerity to slash its investment banking division — a decision Rake believes has been validated.