Current Account was intrigued to notice Rupert Murdoch firmly turning his back on nepotism when he said that none of his children could expect his job when he finally decides to give up the reins at News Corporation.

For years, the expectation was that either son Lachlan or daughter Elizabeth were being groomed to take over from Rupert, but now the boss of News Corp has publicly said that none of his children are ready to take from their old man, "They all have to prove themselves first", he said, warning that he himself will need to be carried out of the News Corp top job. What an admirable approach from Rupert and one hopes it is being watched closely by Dr Tony O'Reilly and Michael Smurfit who are thought to have ambitions to install their sons at the helm of the Independent and Smurfit empires.

Michael Smurfit's determination to have the family dynasty at the helm of Smurfit is well known (irrespective of the fact that the Smurfit family owns less than 10 per cent of the group), with young Tony being groomed to fill his father's shoes when he decides to retire. Tony O'Reilly, of course, has two sons in the family newspaper business, with Cameron looking after Indo's Australian and New Zealand interests and Gavin recently installed at the helm of Indo's Irish operations. A bit of healthy competition, no doubt, between the two boys will eventually lead to one or other taking the Indo top job when sexaganerian chief executive Liam Healy finally steps down.

The third member of the O'Reilly triplets, Tony Junior, has already got himself the chief executive's job, at Arcon. But given the state of the world zinc market this looks more a hardship posting than a steppingstone towards a really big job with his da's real pride and joy, Independent News and Media.