WITH nearly 40 years of experience spanning public and private sectors, in the UK and internationally, Shriti Vadera, chair of insurance giant Prudential plc, has emerged as one of the most influential business leaders in the country. Recently, she was part of an independent panel of ten city leaders who contributed to a review of financial services, launched by the Labour party to set out future policy priorities for the financial services industry. Critics believe that the city has taken a knock following Brexit, with companies picking the likes of Wall Street over London for new listings. As the ruling Conservatives trail badly behind Labour in opinion polls before a general election expected later this year, we could see Vadera, who was a member of the last Labour government, playing a significant role again in propping up the UK economy. She served as a minister under former premier Gordon Brown, jointly in the Cabinet Office and in the International Development and Business departments from 2007-2009, leading the UK government’s response to the financial crisis. She was made Baroness Vadera of Holland Park (London) and elevated to the House of Lords so she could be a fully functional minister of state. The Daily Telegraph at the time described her as “the woman Gordon Brown trusts more than any other in his government.”. She was a key architect of its pioneering bank recapitalisation and funding plan in 2008 and helped design the outcomes of the G20 London Summit in 2009, when the grouping of 19 countries and the EU declared itself the primary venue for international economic and financial cooperation. Vadera stepped down as a minister in 2009 to take up a new role advising the G20 from Downing Street. Between 2010 and 2015, she undertook a wide range of assignments, such