Browne joins government as super-boss
FORMER BP chief executive Lord Browne was confirmed as the coalition government’s “super-director” yesterday in a controversial move that puts him at the heart of Whitehall.
The peer accepted the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives’ invitation to take the unpaid post of “lead non-executive director” in the Cabinet Office. He will be tasked with injecting private sector thinking into the civil service, which has often been accused of waste and overstaffing.
Browne won plaudits in the business community for his 12-year stint at the top of BP, but
was forced to resign in disgrace in 2007 after lying in court about his relationship with
another man, Jeff Chevalier. His career was also marred by the Texas City refinery fire in
2005 and the Prudhoe Bay pipeline fractures in 2006. Questions have been raised about
the culture of cost-cutting instilled by Browne during his time at the FTSE 100 oil giant
given the technical failures leading to BP’s ongoing Gulf of Mexico disaster.
Browne will shortly appoint a further 16 leading figures from the business community to beef up the boards of every government department. Sir Nigel Rudd, the chairman of BAA and Invensys, and Ian Watmore, the former chief executive of the Football Association, are expected to be among them.
Together, the 17 big-hitters will overhaul the way departments report and set up three-year rolling plans to keep secretaries of state in check.
Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: “The appointment of non-executive directors will galvanise departmental boards as forums where political and official leadership is brought together to drive up performance.”|
Browne said the role, tapping his years of expertise, was “within government but also independent of it”.
LORD BROWNE OF MADINGLEY
FORMER CHIEF EXECUTIVE, BP
FOR a man with a diverse range of interests, Edmund Browne – since 2001, Lord Browne of Madingley – was monogamous to BP for 40 years.
Born in Hamburg,?Germany, and educated at St John’s College, Cambridge, Browne joined the energy behemoth in 1966 when it was still known as British?Petroleum. He clambered up the ranks, working in exploration and production posts in Alaska, San Francisco, London and Canada. Browne took senior roles at the Standard?Oil Company in Cleveland after its merger with?BP, becoming chief financial officer of?BP?in America in 1987. By 10 June 1995, he was group chief executive of BP.
Browne was knighted in 1998 and made a life peer in 2001. He was an established and well-respected part of the City landscape in 2007 when a Sunday tabloid printed a kiss-and-tell story from a former gay lover, Jeff Chevalier.
Browne had kept his sexuality secret throughout his career in what is a notoriously
testosterone-driven industry. In an attempt to get an injunction against the newspaper,
Browne lied to?BP’s lawyers and then to a court about how he met Chevalier. When he
was exposed, he was forced to step down as chief executive 18 months earlier than he had previously planned.
Since then, Browne has worked as chairman of the Tate Gallery and managing director of Riverstone Holdings, a private equity firm specialising in energy companies.
Browne joins government as super-boss
FORMER BP chief executive Lord Browne was confirmed as the coalition government’s “super-director” yesterday in a controversial move that puts him at the heart of Whitehall.
The peer accepted the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives’ invitation to take the unpaid post of “lead non-executive director” in the Cabinet Office. He will be tasked with injecting private sector thinking into the civil service, which has often been accused of waste and overstaffing.
Browne won plaudits in the business community for his 12-year stint at the top of BP, but
was forced to resign in disgrace in 2007 after lying in court about his relationship with
another man, Jeff Chevalier. His career was also marred by the Texas City refinery fire in
2005 and the Prudhoe Bay pipeline fractures in 2006. Questions have been raised about
the culture of cost-cutting instilled by Browne during his time at the FTSE 100 oil giant
given the technical failures leading to BP’s ongoing Gulf of Mexico disaster.
Browne will shortly appoint a further 16 leading figures from the business community to beef up the boards of every government department. Sir Nigel Rudd, the chairman of BAA and Invensys, and Ian Watmore, the former chief executive of the Football Association, are expected to be among them.
Together, the 17 big-hitters will overhaul the way departments report and set up three-year rolling plans to keep secretaries of state in check.
Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: “The appointment of non-executive directors will galvanise departmental boards as forums where political and official leadership is brought together to drive up performance.”|
Browne said the role, tapping his years of expertise, was “within government but also independent of it”.
LORD BROWNE OF MADINGLEY
FORMER CHIEF EXECUTIVE, BP
FOR a man with a diverse range of interests, Edmund Browne – since 2001, Lord Browne of Madingley – was monogamous to BP for 40 years.
Born in Hamburg,?Germany, and educated at St John’s College, Cambridge, Browne joined the energy behemoth in 1966 when it was still known as British?Petroleum. He clambered up the ranks, working in exploration and production posts in Alaska, San Francisco, London and Canada. Browne took senior roles at the Standard?Oil Company in Cleveland after its merger with?BP, becoming chief financial officer of?BP?in America in 1987. By 10 June 1995, he was group chief executive of BP.
Browne was knighted in 1998 and made a life peer in 2001. He was an established and well-respected part of the City landscape in 2007 when a Sunday tabloid printed a kiss-and-tell story from a former gay lover, Jeff Chevalier.
Browne had kept his sexuality secret throughout his career in what is a notoriously
testosterone-driven industry. In an attempt to get an injunction against the newspaper,
Browne lied to?BP’s lawyers and then to a court about how he met Chevalier. When he
was exposed, he was forced to step down as chief executive 18 months earlier than he had previously planned.
Since then, Browne has worked as chairman of the Tate Gallery and managing director of Riverstone Holdings, a private equity firm specialising in energy companies.