Last year I wrote an article in the Financial Times bemoaning the lack of ethnic diversity in the City. Just 2.5 per cent of FTSE 100 board members are from an ethnic minority according to Cranfield School of Management, and there is one non-white chief executive. Fewer than 3 per cent and 4 per cent respectively of the partners of most prestigious City law and accountancy firms are drawn from a non-white background, according to Legal Week and Accountancy Age, and the leading investment banks do not fare much better.

Since then several ethnic minority City operators have come to prominence for different reasons. Arun Sarin, the sole non-white FTSE100 chief executive referred to above, has been involved in somewhat of a power struggle at Vodafone this last few months. In February, Damon Buffini, managing director of Europe’s biggest private equity firm, Permira, became the target of the GMB union’s campaign against such firms – the private equity industry stood accused of asset stripping and causing the loss of thousands of jobs.

Today the Guardian has done a profile on another leading ethnic minority City personality, whose profile is on the rise – former Ivroian politician, Tidjane Thiam (pictured), managing director of Aviva (Europe), the fifth largest insurer in the world. Thiam was also recently a member of Tony Blair’s Africa Commission. Perhaps, slowly, things are beginning to change in the City and the world of financial services?

Chuka Umunna, Editor