Brewin Dolphin would consider management change at Alliance Trust Brewin Dolphin, the private client stockbroker that speaks for clients holding 5pc of Alliance shares, has expressed its admiration for Aberdeen Asset Management, the FTSE 100 fund management business that has expressed its interest in taking over the management contract for the Alliance portfolio and replacing the current in-house team led by Katherine Garrett-Cox. John Newlands, head of investment company research at Brewin Dolphin, said: "Aberdeen Asset Management is an impressive investment management company. We will expect them to put forward a serious proposition, which we will consider on behalf of clients. We will only act in our clients' best interests. However, the Alliance Board has rejected a separate request from Laxey Partners, another shareholder with 1.7pc, for it to examine the possibility of appointing external fund managers. Brewin Dolphin is thought to be keen to distance itself from Laxey's campaign for change at Alliance and it is known to be formulating a clear view of its own. If an external fund management were to be appointed by the board of Alliance, Brewin Dolphin would want to be satisfied on a number of points on behalf of its many retail clients. "One unanswered question is whether there would be a lead fund manager," said Mr Newlands on Tuesday. Shareholders such as Brewin Dolphin would be unlikely to vote in favour of change if the management of Alliance's portfolio disappeared into a faceless fund management office. It is understood that Brewin Dolphin also believes that the likelihood of shareholders accepting an external manager would be increased if there remained a Scottish connection for Alliance under any new management. The trust has a strong connection with Dundee, although Ms Garrett-Cox has been recruiting more fund management staff in London and Edinburgh recently. Martin Gilbert, chief executive of Aberdeen Asset Management, has said that if his company ran Alliance it would be run out of his company's Edinburgh office, where other successful global portfolios - such as the Murray International investment trust - are based.