A wind of change is blowing through the City of London: it's back to the office, or else

THE City boss was fuming about the lack of staff in his expensive office on Friday. "You can make money and not turn up.

- Simon English

You can turn up and not make money," he said. "You can't not turn up and not make any money."

That's what he would say to staff if HR would let him - they are going to get the message fairly clearly anyway. That view is running strong in the Square Mile. Banks are less likely to ask Covid-traumatised staff, how are you? Now it's more: get in and crack on.

A few things are playing into this shift. There's a general back-to-school feel, a desire that this year is different from the last.

Companies also want certainty on their real estate - how much do they need and when? So those banks that are relaxed about seeing staff three days a week are demanding to know, which three? The other factor for the traditional City- the shirt-sleeved traders and bankers is that there isn't enough business at the moment to keep them all in lunch.

If things don't pick up by Christmas, redundancies are coming -a bonfire of the bankers, perhaps.

Another City boss says: "It's no longer 2/3 days in but 3/4. The investment banks are making cuts and it doesn't help not to be seen.

The temperature has been boiling and I see full offices, not bankers working from the garden." The days when office incentives were the plan- free taxis, free food, free hairdos have been replaced by an approach that is more stick than carrot.