Sir Adam Nicholas Ridley (born 14 May 1942) is a British economist, civil servant, and banker. After working at the

Foreign Office Foreign may refer to: Government * Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries * Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries ** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government ** Foreign office and foreign minister * Unit ...

and the Department of Economic Affairs, he was Director of the

Conservative Research Department The Conservative Research Department (CRD) is part of the central organisation of the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom. It operates alongside other departments of Conservative Campaign Headquarters in Westminster. The CRD has been describ ...

. With

Chris Patten Christopher Francis Patten, Baron Patten of Barnes, (; born 12 May 1944) is a British politician who was the 28th and last Governor of Hong Kong from 1992 to 1997 and Chairman of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1992. He was made a life pe ...

he wrote the Conservative election manifesto of 1979 and after the election was a Special Advisor to the

Chancellors of the Exchequer Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...

until 1984. He later served as a director of

Hambros Bank Hambros Bank was a British bank based in London. The Hambros bank was a specialist in Anglo-Scandinavian business with expertise in trade finance and investment banking, and was the sole banker to the Scandinavian kingdoms for many years. The Bank ...

, of

Morgan Stanley Morgan Stanley is an American multinational investment management and financial services company headquartered at 1585 Broadway in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. With offices in more than 41 countries and more than 75,000 employees, the fir ...

, and of

Equitas Equitas is a group of companies that was formed in 1996 to assume by way of reinsurance the vast and crippling liabilities that had accumulated in the syndicates at Lloyd's of London on insurance policies written on the 1992 and all prior years of ...

insurance companies.

Early life and background

The son of Jasper Maurice Alexander Ridley (1913–1943), by his marriage to Helen Laura Cressida Bonham-Carter, a daughter of Sir Maurice Bonham-Carter and Violet Asquith (herself a daughter of the British prime minister H. H. Asquith), Ridley lost his father during the Second World War. His grandfather, Sir Jasper Nicholas Ridley (1887–1951), was the younger son of Matthew White Ridley, 1st Viscount Ridley, Home Secretary in Lord Salisbury's government from 1895 to 1900, while his paternal grandmother was Nathalie von Benckendorff, a daughter of

Count Alexander Benckendorff Count Alexander Philipp Konstantin Ludwig von Benckendorff (russian: link=no, Александр Константинович Бенкендорф, Alexander Konstantinovich Benkendorf; 1 August 1849 – 11 January 1917) was a Russian diplomat, of ...

, Charles Mosley, ed., ''Burke's Peerage and Baronetage'', 106th edition, vol. 1 (Crans, Switzerland: Burke's Peerage, 1999), p. 30

L. G. Pine Leslie Gilbert Pine (22 December 1907 – 15 May 1987) was a British writer, lecturer, and researcher in the areas of genealogy, nobility, history, heraldry and animal welfare. Early life and education Pine was born at Bristol, the son of Henry Mo ...

, ''The New Extinct Peerage 1884–1971: Containing Extinct, Abeyant, Dormant and Suspended Peerages with Genealogies and Arms'' (London: Heraldry Today, 1972), pp. 16, 276 Russian Ambassador to the

Court of St James's The Court of St James's is the royal court for the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. All ambassadors to the United Kingdom are formally received by the court. All ambassadors from the United Kingdom are formally accredited from the court – & ...

between 1903 and 1917. Ridley was educated at Eton and

Balliol College, Oxford Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the f ...

, where he took first class honours in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics in 1965.'RIDLEY, Sir Adam (Nicholas)', in '' Who's Who 2014'' (London: A. & C. Black, 2014) He is a first cousin of the actress Helena Bonham Carter and a more distant cousin of the Conservative cabinet minister Nicholas Ridley and the historian Jane Ridley.

Career

After joining the

in 1965, Ridley was quickly seconded to the recently established Department of Economic Affairs, where he remained until 1968. He was a Harkness Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, for the academic year 1968–1969, then returned to the Civil Service. He was with HM Treasury from 1970 to 1971, then joined Edward Heath new

Central Policy Review Staff The Central Policy Review Staff (CPRS), nicknamed the "Think-Tank", was an independent unit within the Cabinet Office of the United Kingdom tasked with developing long term strategy and co-ordinating policy across government departments. It was es ...

(or "Think Tank") and remained there until the change of government in 1974. He then served for five years as Economic Adviser to the Conservative Shadow Cabinets of Heath and Margaret Thatcher. In 1975, when Thatcher wrested the party leadership from Heath, Ridley was part of her inner circle, and in his book ''A View from the Wings'' Ronald Millar recalls working into the small hours with Ridley and

on Thatcher's first speech as leader to a Conservative Party conference. In the summer of 1978, in the expectation of a general election later that year, a Conservative Party election manifesto was drafted by Ridley and Patten and edited by Angus Maude. In 1979, Ridley became Director of the

. Following the Conservative victory in the general election of 1979, he was briefly at 10, Downing Street, before returning to the Treasury as a Special Advisor to Sir Geoffrey Howe and Nigel Lawson as

between 1979 and 1984. In his memoir ''Inside the Bank of England'',

Christopher Dow John Christopher Roderick Dow, FBA (1916–1998) was a British applied economist whose career ran from 1945 until his death in 1998. He was educated at Bootham School, York and University College London. During his career he worked in some o ...

notes that in 1979 only Ridley was brought into the Treasury as a political advisor, and that he was trusted even though he was not a

monetarist Monetarism is a school of thought in monetary economics that emphasizes the role of governments in controlling the amount of money in circulation. Monetarist theory asserts that variations in the money supply have major influences on national ...

, ''Inside the Bank of England: Memoirs of Christopher Dow, Chief Economist 1973–84'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)
p. 110
/ref> Ridley played a leading part in forming the new government's policy favouring

privatisation Privatization (also privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when ...

. Ridley's final post in the world of government was as advisor to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster for part of 1985. That year, he was knighted and made a career move into merchant banking. He was a director of

and of Hambros PLC from 1985 to 1997, and of Sunday Newspaper Publishing PLC from 1988 to 1990, serving as chairman in 1990. He was also Chairman of the Lloyd's of London Names Advisory Committee for 1995–1996, then a member of the Council of Lloyds and of the Lloyds Regulatory Board from 1997 to 1999. After leaving Hambros, he was a non-executive director of Leopold Joseph Holdings from 1997 to 2004, of Morgan Stanley Bank International from 2006 to 2013 and of Hampden Agencies Ltd from 2007 to 2012, and then of several

insurance companies from 2009 to date. He served on the

National Lottery Charities Board The National Lottery Community Fund, legally named the Big Lottery Fund, is a non-departmental public body responsible for distributing funds raised by the National Lottery for "good causes". Since 2004 it has awarded over £9 billion to ...

from 1994 to 2000, most of that time as its Deputy chairman, and since 2003 has been a member of the Council of the

British School at Athens , image = Image-Bsa athens library.jpg , image_size = 300px , image_upright= , alt= , caption = The library of the BSA , latin_name= , motto= , founder = The Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, called the foundation meeti ...

Private life

In 1970 Ridley married firstly his second cousin Lady Katharine Asquith, one of the daughters of Julian Asquith, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Asquith, but this ended in divorce in 1976. In 1981, he married secondly Margaret Anne Passmore, and they have three sons. He is a member of the Garrick Club and the

Political Economy Club The Political Economy Club is the world's oldest economics association founded by James Mill and a circle of friends in 1821 in London, for the purpose of coming to an agreement on the fundamental principles of political economy. David Ricardo, ...

. Christopher Dow recalled in his memoirs that when invited to lunch at the

Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the English Government's banker, and still one of the bankers for the Government of ...

Ridley habitually arrived by motorcycle.

Publications

*''Europe, the Challenge of Diversity'' (Routledge & Kegan Paul, Chatham House Papers series, 1985), with Helen Wallacejstor reference page
accessed 21 March 2014

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ridley, Adam Nicholas 1942 births Living people British people of Russian descent People educated at Eton College Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford University of California, Berkeley fellows Knights Bachelor British bankers British civil servants Adam Ridley Asquith family