Albert Manifold

Albert Manifold, when he was appointed, was kind of seen as a bit left of field.

As you said, he didn't have any industry experience.

Yes, CRH is a huge company, but it's not a household brand.

It's not a sort of a name that trips off the tongue in, say, other countries outside Ireland, despite its scale.

So there was a slight sniffiness, certainly from some of the reportage at the time when he got appointed, of sort of, who is this guy?

Essentially, you know, where has he come from?

Why has he not been...

in the industry before.

So he may have sort of felt, well, I need to bring my own sort of attributes to this job.

And maybe he was just very aggressive on the cost-cutting piece, which, you know, a lot of shareholders would support.

But maybe it just rubbed other people up the wrong way.

And do you know what, Clare?

It's possible we will never find out unless they write a memoir or a book many years down the road.