Is the north-south divide a turn-off to asset management talent?

The Scottish-English rivalry is of course as old as the hills, but when healthy banter turns to outright animosity, there's a danger that skilled workers could head south of the border again. But, surely, in the cosmopolitan financial services sector, such prejudice doesn't exist.

New research from Edinburgh University's department of sociology has highlighted how anti-English attitudes are driving skilled graduates out of Scotland.

"We found there was a general sense of underlying anti-Englishness," said the report's lead author, Ross Bond.

If widespread, this is a particularly dangerous trend for Scotland's fund management sector, which relies on both a pipeline of top graduates from south of the border, as well as recruiting talent from roles in the City of London.

A quick glance at the upper echelons of Scottish fund management shows a healthy mix of English and Scottish. Willie Watt, chief executive officer of Martin Currie is Scottish, while both Keith Skeoch, CEO of Standard Life Investments and Katherine Garrett-Cox, who heads up the Alliance Trust, hail from south of the border.

Similarly, lower down the ranks, there's no shortage of Englishmen, such as David Page, a director at Martin Currie and Marcus Brooks, director - investment at Cornelian Asset Management.

John Jackson, chief operating officer at Cornelian Asset Management, believes that there's no prejudice against recruiting English people for roles in Scotland, and that those who have been hired have never encountered resistance from either clients or colleagues.

"The biggest issue is persuading people to move from the hub that is the City of London," he says. "But this is less a Scottish-English issue and more a reluctance to be away from the heart of things. I imagine there's a similar issue with people moving from New York to Chicago."

City experience is valued, but it can be difficult attracting people north of the border, says Richard Barrie, HR manager at Baillie Gifford: "Traditionally, we have struggled to recruit people for senior roles who have little or no Scottish connection."

The Edinburgh University research is "embarrassing if true" says Richard Fletcher, director of asset management focused headhunters Fletcher Jones, but he insists there's no such issue in the Scottish financial services industry.

"The concerns we encounter are less about anti-English sentiment and more around lifestyle and family issues - whether schools in Edinburgh are good enough etc. People need reassurance, but there's little prejudice over nationality; we recruit people from all over the world for asset management roles in Scotland."