Francis Maude

The Rt Hon. Francis Maude
Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office
Incumbent
Assumed office 2 July 2007
Leader	David Cameron
Chairman of the Conservative Party
In office 6 December 2005 – 2 July 2007
Preceded by	Liam Fox
Succeeded by	Caroline Spelman
Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
In office 15 June 1999 – 18 September 2001
Leader	William Hague
Preceded by	John Maples
Succeeded by	Michael Ancram
Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
In office 2 June 1997 – 15 June 1999
Preceded by	Peter Lilley
Succeeded by	Michael Portillo
Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
In office 4 May 1997 – 2 June 1998
Preceded by	Chris Smith
Succeeded by	Peter Ainsworth
Financial Secretary to the Treasury
In office 28 November 1990 – 11 April 1992
Prime Minister	John Major
Preceded by	Peter Lilley
Succeeded by	Stephen Dorrell
Personal details
Born	(1953-07-04) July 4, 1953 Abingdon, Oxfordshire, UK
Political party	Conservative
Profession	Lawyer

Francis Anthony Aylmer Maude (born 4 July 1953) is a British politician, the Conservative Member of Parliament for Horsham, Shadow Minister for the Cabinet Office and a member of the Privy Council.

Early Life

The son of former Conservative minister Angus Maude, Francis Maude was educated at Abingdon School, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge and the College of Law and practised criminal law. He was a councillor for the City of Westminster 1978–84.

Member of Parliament

He was MP for North Warwickshire from 1983 to 1992, serving as a junior minister in a variety of posts until he lost his seat at the 1992 general election to the Labour candidate, Mike O'Brien.

Shadow Cabinet

Maude worked in banking as Managing Director of Morgan Stanley while outside parliament, but returned to politics upon his election as an MP in the 1997 for Horsham. In his second spell in Parliament he has served as Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Shadow Foreign Secretary.

Following the 2001 election he managed Michael Portillo's unsuccessful bid for the Conservative leadership. After the election of Iain Duncan Smith, he declined to enter the Shadow Cabinet and returned to the backbenches. He is considered to be a 'moderniser' and on the left of the party, and is Chairman of the think tank "Conservatives for Change".

In theThe Daily Telegraph (24 June 2002) he stated that the Conservative Party's electoral problems had been caused by their failure to "look and sound like modern Britain". He was subsequently criticised in the Telegraph on 27 June by Michael Keith Smith, chairman of the Conservative Democratic Alliance, (a group formed in the wake of the Monday Club's expulsion from the Conservative Party).

Norman Tebbit's secretary, Beryl Goldsmith, also criticised Maude on the same day, asking: "How many male, white, straight Conservative MPs currently passionately campaigning for the selection of more women, and more men and women from ethnic minorities, would voluntarily relinquish their own seats in order to encourage local associations to follow the policy line they preach from their own smug, safe base? Precious few I would guess — including Mr Francis Maude."

In the post-election 2005 reshuffle, Maude returned to the Shadow Cabinet as Chairman of the Conservative Party. On 2 July 2007, he was moved to the post of Shadow Cabinet Office Minister.

Personal Life

Maude is father of five: Julia, Cecily, Harry, Alastair and Lydia.

Controversies

In 2006 the Daily Mirror reported that the Jubilee Trust, a company in which Maude is a non-executive Chairman, held 21% of American pornography actress Jill Kelly's adult DVD business.

He has also been linked by The Observer to the company employed to make controversial advertisements for Playboy TV, drawing the same criticisms[1], and to alcopop advertisements, which some people have complained are linked to binge drinking. The commercials - for WKD - have since been banned.[2]

Quotes on HIV

In 2006, he told the gay news website (PinkNews.co.uk) that his opinions on gay issues were "informed by my family, my wonderful, intelligent, beloved brother. The gay scene in London in the 1980s was quite aggressively promiscuous and I think if society generally and the government I served in had been more willing to recognise gay people then there would have been less of that problem." "A lot of people like my brother would not have succumbed to HIV and lost their lives."

Maude told Pinknews "that the Conservative anti gay legislation such as Section 28 in 1988, which prohibited local councils from publishing materials on homosexuality and led to the closing of gay support groups, was an error." .

See also

• Official Opposition Shadow Cabinet (UK)

External links

• Francis Maude MP official site
• Conservative Party — Rt Hon Francis Maude MP official biography
• Guardian Unlimited Politics Ask Aristotle — Francis Maude MP
• They Work For You — Francis Maude MP
• The Public Whip — Francis Maude MP voting record
• BBC Politics — Francis Maude profile 10 February 2005

Offices held

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