Monday newspaper round-up: Brexit, Aston Martin, mobile operators, RBS

Most forms of Brexit will worsen the country’s finances and reduce space for new initiatives to address child poverty, social care and left-behind communities that some argue drove the Brexit vote, a report has found. Academics at the UK in a Changing Europe thinktank found a positive outcome depended on politicians being able to move on from the Brexit impasse and focus on longer-term challenges including productivity, regional imbalances and democratic reform. – Guardian

The chief executive of Aston Martin faces the prospect of a vote against his pay package as he faces shareholders for the luxury carmaker’s first annual meeting as a listed company. Andy Palmer has led the company since 2014, but investor scrutiny of his £1.2m salary – before a potential bonus five times larger – has increased as shares have slumped from the price at the carmaker’s much-anticipated stock market flotation. – Guardian

Mobile operators should face scrutiny from cartel watchdogs over High Court claims of attempted price fixing and collusion, according to the leader of a cross-party group of MPs. Grant Shapps, the Conservative chairman of the cross-party British Infrastructure Group, called on the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to consider opening a formal investigation of the mobile industry. – Telegraph

An investment banker was handed a key role in an investigation into a small business scandal at Royal Bank of Scotland because the Financial Conduct Authority lacked knowledge of commercial lending, The Times can reveal. In what a victims’ representative called the “blind leading the blind”, Rene Poisson, a former JP Morgan managing director, was hired as a third-party consultant by the City regulator to help to oversee an inquiry into the treatment of small companies by RBS’s Global Restructuring Group. – The Times

When Luke Miels was poached from Astrazeneca two years ago to lead the pharmaceuticals division of Glaxosmithkline, his defection triggered a bitter legal dispute between Britain’s biggest drugs companies. Mr Miels, Astrazeneca’s head of Europe, was a protégé of Pascal Soriot, its chief executive, and his controversial departure came at a crucial period for the rival businesses. Astrazeneca was on the verge of achieving a painstaking recovery in its drugs business, while Glaxo was only just beginning to rebuild its pipeline. – The Times