Former Qantas CEO James Strong is being touted in some industry quarters as the next chairman of NRMA Insurance. The much-admired Mr Strong is seen as the best choice to bring stability to the company’s fractured board of directors.

One of his first jobs might be to open up communications with former chairman Nicholas Whitlam, who remains President of NRMA Ltd, the road services arm. The revamp of NRMA Insurance’s strategic plan includes the closure of 21 of its 66 branches in NSW and the ACT.

The closures are an acknowledgement of the need to rely on cheaper and more efficient distribution channels like call centres and better B2C developments. They were also made possible by the decision to sell the NRMA Building Society and concentrate on general insurance and the retirement income market.

That led the road services “sister” – which shares the branches ­– to seek an injunction against NRMA Insurance in the NSW Supreme Court last Thursday. NRMA claimed the plan breaks agreements made when the insurance arm was demutualised.

NRMA was at pains to make the point that the injunction decision was made by the mutual’s management, not its board. The preliminary skirmish in court on Friday revealed that if the NRMA board wasn’t informed, the court action was probably unconstitutional.

Not surprisingly, Mr Brown’s Thursday announcement that the company has taken a crucial business decision was completely overshadowed by the dispute. He admitted the NRMA move both disappointed and surprised him.

Even though the two organisations are only two floors apart, by late Friday the dispute was being fought out in statements to the media.