Shriti Vadera

This article is part of the Mining and Metals project of Spinwatch

Baroness Shriti Vadera is a pro-industry and privatisation politician and former investment banker. Until September 2009, she was a government minister jointly for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Cabinet Office. She is a non-executive director of mining giant BHP Billiton and pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca.

Banking background

Vadera was Executive Director at Warburg Dillon Read, where she worked on banking and privatisation teams playing a role in the partial privatisation of South African Telecom. She is an expert on Public-Private Partnership (PPP) deals.

Gordon Brown's 'representative on earth'

Following 15 years with Warburg she spent 10 years in Gordon Brown's office including as Minister for Overseas Development at the Department for International Development from June until December 2007 and subsequently a minister for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (then the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform) as well as a minister for the Cabinet Office and became a close friend and advisor of his, known as 'Gordon Brown's representative on earth'.

As Vadera was not a member of either of the Houses of Parliament, she was created a life peer on 11 July 2007 as Baroness Vadera.The Sunday Times reported that the Cabinet Secretary "flatly refus[ed] to allow her to cross the threshold of No 10 as policy enforcer" and "no Permanent Secretary could stand her" - although the Cabinet Secretary denied making these comments.

She was the Treasury's top negotiator in the PPP scheme to part-privatise the London tube network, telling London transport commissioner Bob Kiley she 'could not sanction public control of the tube under any circumstances' on February 12th 2001. She was also a key architect in the 2008 bank bailout.

The London Evening Standard stated she the most powerful person in Gordon Brown's cabinet, in reality 'the Prime Minister's principal fixer' and 'has three desks - in the Business Department, Cabinet Office and Number 10'.

According to a Guardian report in which she was 'nominated' to be a future Governor of the Bank of England by (BBC journalist and Social Market Foundation advisor) Evan Davis:

Shriti Vadera, a publicity-shy former banker, is one of the key figures behind the scenes in the Treasury, where she has been central to the development of public-private partnerships. She's the main point of contact between the Treasury and the City, and has impressed those she has dealt with. "She combines financial expertise and political common sense," says Evan Davis. "Her appointment would be greeted with gushing enthusiasm everywhere, from City wine bars to high-street charity shops - she is on Oxfam's council of trustees."

Life after government

Vadera stepped down as business minister in September 2009 to take up a new role advising the G20 from Downing Street on behalf of South Korea, which held the G20 chair.

According to the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments she took up a part-time consultancy role with the Dubai government shortly after April 2010.

In December 2010 Vadera was appointed a non-executive director of mining giant BHP Billiton and Big Pharma company AstraZeneca.

Affiliations

• Oxfam (five years as a trustee 2000-2005)
• advisor to Gordon Brown
• AstraZeneca board member since 2010
• BHP Billiton board member since 2010
• Temasek Holdings - Financial and strategic advisor since June 2010