Philip Hammond
Philip Hammond, Baron Hammond of Runnymede is a British politician and life peer who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2016 to 2019 and Foreign Secretary from 2014 to 2016, having previously served as Defence Secretary from 2011 to 2014 and Transport Secretary from 2010 to 2011. A member of the Conservative Party, he was the Member of Parliament for Runnymede and Weybridge from 1997 to 2019.
Born in Epping, Essex, Hammond studied Philosophy, politics and economics at University College, Oxford. He worked from 1984 as a company director at Castlemead Ltd – a healthcare and nursing company. From 1995 to 1997, he acted as an adviser to the government of Malawi before his election to Parliament.
Hammond served in the Shadow Cabinets of Michael Howard and David Cameron as Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions from 2005 to 2007 and Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury in 2005 and from 2007 to 2010. After the formation of the Coalition Government in May 2010, he was appointed Secretary of State for Transport and was sworn of the Privy Council. Upon the resignation of Liam Fox over a scandal in October 2011, Hammond was promoted to replace him as Secretary of State for Defence, before being further promoted in July 2014 to become Foreign Secretary.
In July 2016, after Theresa May succeeded Cameron as prime minister, Hammond was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. As chancellor, Hammond suggested that the government may begin a reduction in austerity measures. In July 2019, he spoke in an interview with Andrew Marr of his plans to tender his resignation to Theresa May should Boris Johnson become the new Leader of the Conservative Party and prime minister, on the grounds that, should he be part of the Johnson Cabinet, collective responsibility would require him to support a no-deal Brexit. With the later selection of Johnson as the next prime minister, he tendered his resignation to May. He had the Conservative whip removed in September 2019 for voting against Johnson's government and subsequently sat as an independent MP, while remaining a member of the party. He did not stand for re-election in the 2019 election.
Early life
Hammond was born in Epping, Essex, the son of a civil engineer. He was educated at Shenfield School in Brentwood, Essex, where he was a classmate of Richard Madeley. He then read Philosophy, politics and economics at University College, Oxford, where he was an Open Scholar, and graduated with a first-class honours degree.Hammond joined the medical equipment manufacturers Speywood Laboratories Ltd in 1977, becoming a director of Speywood Medical Limited in 1981. He left in 1983 and, from 1984, served as a director in Castlemead Ltd.
From 1993 to 1995, he was a partner in CMA Consultants and, from 1994, a director in Castlemead Homes. He had many business interests including house building and property, manufacturing, healthcare, and oil and gas. He worked as a consultant to the Government of Malawi from 1995 until his election to Parliament.
Early political career
Hammond was the Chairman of the Lewisham East Conservative Association for seven years from 1989, and was also a political assistant to Colin Moynihan, then MP for Lewisham East and Minister of Sport. He contested the 1994 Newham North East by-election following the death of sitting Labour MP Ron Leighton, losing in this rock-solid Labour seat to Stephen Timms by 11,818 votes, Hammond only polling 14.5% of the vote. He was elected to the House of Commons at the 1997 general election for the newly created Surrey seat of Runnymede and Weybridge. He won the seat with a majority of 9,875 and remained its MP until 2019. He made his maiden speech on 17 June 1997.In Parliament, he served on the Environment, Transport and the Regions Select committee from 1997 until he was promoted by William Hague as front bench spokesman for Health. He was moved to become a spokesman for Trade and Industry by Iain Duncan Smith in 2001, and later transferred to Shadow Minister for Local Government and Regions in 2002.
Howard promoted Hammond to his Shadow Cabinet following the 2005 general election as Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Following the election of David Cameron as Conservative leader later in 2005, Hammond became the Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. He was moved back to the role of Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury in David Cameron's reshuffle following Gordon Brown's accession to the premiership.
In government
Secretary of State for Transport (2010–2011)
Hammond was appointed Secretary of State for Transport following the formation of the coalition government on 12 May 2010, a position he held until 14 October 2011.On 28 September 2011, the government initiated a consultation on plans to raise the speed limit on motorways from 70 mph to 80 mph, to introduce the new limit in 2013. However, following criticism, including that modelling predicted a 20+% increase in motorway deaths and would alienate women voters, the plans were dropped by his successor.
Secretary of State for Defence (2011–2014)
Hammond became Secretary of State for Defence on 14 October 2011 when Liam Fox resigned. As Secretary of State for Defence, Hammond became a member of the National Security Council.In December 2011, women were allowed to serve on Royal Navy submarines. The first women officers began serving on s in late 2013. They were due to be followed by female ratings in 2015, when women should also begin serving on the new s. It was also confirmed that the cost of the Libyan operations was £212 million – less than was estimated – including £67 million for replacing spent munitions, is all expected to be met from HM Treasury's reserve.
In January 2012, the Ministry of Defence cut 4,200 jobs in the second round of armed forces redundancies. The Army would see up to 2,900 job cuts, including 400 Gurkhas, while the RAF would lose up to 1,000 members and the Royal Navy up to 300. The job losses would account for some of the cuts under the defence review – intended to help plug the £38 billion hole in the defence budget. Hammond said the Government had "no choice but to reduce the size of the armed forces – while reconfiguring them to ensure they remain agile, adaptable and effective".
The £38 billion "black hole" in Ministry of Defence finances had been "dealt with" and the department's "hand to mouth existence would come to an end", Hammond stated in February 2012. Ministers had even found £2.1 billion to be allocated to several major spending projects to be introduced in the coming weeks. The money was to come from a combination of cuts over the previous two years, bargaining with industry suppliers and a one per cent increase in the equipment budget.
In February 2012, Hammond said that the Falkland Islands did not face a "current credible military threat" from Argentina. He added that Britain had "no desire or intention to increase the heat" surrounding their sovereignty. Speaking in the House of Commons he said "despite media speculation to the contrary, there has been no recent change to force levels", adding "there is no evidence of any current credible military threat to the security of the Falkland Islands and therefore no current plan for significant changes to force deployments."
In August 2012, Hammond cut senior positions within the "top-heavy" military by a quarter. Around 26 civilian and military head office posts would go and a new senior structure would come in from April 2013. The move was expected to save the Ministry of Defence around £3.8 million a year. Hammond said one in four posts from the ranks of commodore, brigadier, air commodore and above would go.
Four weeks before the London Olympic Games of 2012, the security company G4S could not provide the number of security staff it had originally undertaken to deploy for the games. Hammond solved the problem by deploying 5,000 members of the armed forces making good the shortfall. Their performance attracted widespread praise.
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (2014–2016)
On 15 July 2014, Hammond was appointed Foreign Secretary. Newspapers highlighted his "Eurosceptic" credentials, and his confidence that Britain could "get a deal" on reforming the European Union. He said that he would vote in a putative referendum for a British exit from the European Union unless there were changes in the relationship, but following David Cameron's renegotiation, he supported the Remain campaign.In August 2014, Hammond said he was surprised at the sudden resignation of Sayeeda Warsi, Baroness Warsi, who wrote of "great unease" under his leadership of the Foreign office.
In March 2015, Hammond stated that Britain would support the Saudi Arabian–led intervention in Yemen "in every practical way short of engaging in combat." He also told Parliament that the Saudi-led coalition had complied with humanitarian law. This statement was later corrected by the Foreign Office as, according to the Foreign Office, he should have said: "Looking at all the information available to us, we have been unable to assess that there has been a breach of International Humanitarian Law by the Saudi-led coalition". As a result of these discrepancies, Labour MP Ann Clwyd asked the Commons Speaker John Bercow to refer the incident to the relevant parliamentary authority so that they can decide whether Hammond deliberately misled the MPs or if it was an honest mistake.
In March 2015, speaking as the minister responsible for the intelligence agencies, he suggested that terror "apologists" must share blame in terrorist acts, saying "But a huge burden of responsibility also lies with those who act as apologists for them."On 8 July 2015, Hammond condemned the defeat by Russia at the UN Security Council of his four-page draft resolution S/2015/508, which would have applied the genocide label to the Srebrenica massacre of Muslim Bosniaks in 1995. Angola, China, Nigeria and Venezuela abstained, while the draft had been proposed by Jordan, Lithuania, Malaysia, New Zealand, the UK and the US. The Russian ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, criticised the British wording as "confrontational and politically-motivated", arguing that it unfairly singled out Bosnian Serbs for committing war crimes in a conflict in which all three ethnic groups were the victims of atrocities. Hammond stated that: "We are disappointed that our resolution to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Srebrenica was vetoed today."
On 14 July 2015, after several years of on-again-off-again negotiations, the P5+1 reached agreement with Iran over the Nuclear program of Iran. Hammond was present in Vienna as the UK representative for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action disclosure ceremony. Hammond presented the deal in Commons the next day, and was in Jerusalem for a joint press conference with Benjamin Netanyahu, which was described as "tense".
Hammond described the United Nations findings regarding the detention of Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London on 6 February 2016 as "ridiculous". Mads Andenæs commented, "When countries respond in this way, they damage the respect for the rule of law and the United Nations."
In October 2015, Justice Secretary Michael Gove cancelled a £5.9 million contract to provide services for prisons in the Saudi Arabia, saying "the British government should not be assisting a regime that uses beheadings, stoning, crucifixions and lashings as forms of punishment." Foreign Secretary Hammond accused Gove of "naivety".
In November 2015, Hammond was criticised for accepting a watch worth £1,950 from Saudi businessman Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz. The watch was given as a gift after the unveiling of a statue of the Queen to mark the 800th anniversary of the sealing of Magna Carta. Ministers are not allowed to accept gifts worth more than £140 but Hammond claims he was advised that the event was a constituency one, not a ministerial one, and therefore the rules for ministers did not apply to him on that day. Labour MP John Mann was among those who criticised Hammond. "What on earth was he doing?" Mann asked, "No MP should be accepting watches worth nearly £2,000 as a gift. He should now give it to charity."