Read this about Michael (now Lord) Heseltine, who was a popular DefSec:
"After graduating he built up a property business in partnership with his Oxford friend Ian Josephs; with financial support from the families of both men they started with a boarding house in Clanricarde Gardens and progressed to various other properties in the Bayswater area. He also attempted to train as an
accountant but did not qualify, and after failing his accountancy exams could no longer postpone
National Service. He was called up in January 1959 and became a
Second Lieutenant in the
Welsh Guards. He left the Guards to contest the General Election that year and on business grounds was exempted from the remaining sixteen months of [his twenty-four months] service. During the 1980s his habit of wearing a Guards tie, sometimes incorrectly tied with red showing on the knot, was the subject of much acerbic comment from military figures and older MPs with extensive war records.
Michael Crick estimates that he must have worn the tie on more days than he actually served in the Guards."
Does a Chancellor need an accountancy qualification?