Lionel Laurent, Columnist

Corbyn's Corporate Enemies Are Making His Life Too Easy

It's good that Capita is taking radical steps to fix itself, but the rot is deep among Britain's contractors.

January 31, 2018 at 11:26 AM UTC

Lionel Laurent is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist writing about the future of money and the future of Europe. Previously, he was a reporter for Reuters and Forbes.

1517400982_corbyn — Creator Simon Dawson

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Anyone would be forgiven for seeing similarities between British outsourcing firm Capita Plc -- whose share price has fallen 80 percent since 2016 -- and its sorry peers. After a string of profit warnings and the collapse of Carillion Plc, the once mighty U.K. support services sector has become a laughing stock and a political nightmare.

But Capita is different, apparently. "We should not be compared to the 'G4Ss and Interserves' of the world," its newly appointed CEO Jon Lewis told analysts. "We are not a blue collar firm, we are a tech-enabled, digitally focused company."