Maurice Saatchi, Baron Saatchi

The Right Honourable The Lord Saatchi
Chairman of the Conservative Party
In office with Liam Fox 10 November 2003 – 20 May 2005
Leader	Michael Howard
Preceded by	Theresa May
Succeeded by	Francis Maude
Personal details
Born	21 June 1946 (1946-06-21) (age 65) Baghdad, Iraq
Political party	Conservative
Relations	Charles Saatchi (brother)
Profession	Advertising
Religion	Jewish

Maurice Nathan Saatchi, Baron Saatchi (born 21 June 1946) is the co-founder, with his brother Charles, of the advertising agencies Saatchi and Saatchi and M&C Saatchi, where he currently serves as Executive Director.

Biography

Early life

Maurice Saatchi is the third of four sons born to Nathan Saatchi and Daisy Ezer, a wealthy Iraqi Jewish family in Baghdad, Iraq. Maurice's brothers are David (born 1937), Charles Nathan (born 1943) and Philip (born 1953).^[1] Nathan was a successful textile merchant and in 1947, he pre-empted a flight that tens of thousands of Iraqi Jews would soon make to avoid persecution and relocated his family to Finchley^[2] London.^[3] Nathan purchased two textile mills in north London and after a time re-built a thriving business. Eventually the family would settle into a house with eight bedrooms on Hampstead Lane in Highgate.^[1]

Saatchi attended Tollington Grammar and graduated from the London School of Economics with first class honours in 1967.^[1] His first job was at Haymarket Publications where Maurice would form valuable relationships with Michael Heseltine, the Group Managing Director and with staff at the Haymarket's leading trade weekly for the ad industry Campaign. He spent three years at Haymarket as Creative Director before leaving to join his brother Charles' fledgling ad agency.

Advertising career

In 1970, Saatchi, with his brother, formed the advertising agency Saatchi and Saatchi. They are credited with a number of successful advertising campaigns, most notably the "Labour isn't working" posters on behalf of the Conservative Party for the 1979 British general election and advertisements for the cigarette brand Silk Cut.^[4] Maurice Saatchi served as chairman of the firm which became the world's largest advertising agency.^[5] However, a shareholder revolt in 1994 ended the brothers' role in the company, and they founded a new company, M&C Saatchi, the following year. The new company has also been described as a success.^[5]

Political career

Maurice Saatchi was created a life peer as Baron Saatchi, of Staplefield in the County of West Sussex in 1996. He sits in the House of Lords as a Conservative. Under the leadership of Iain Duncan Smith, Saatchi served as shadow Treasury spokesman in the Lords, forming a close relationship with the then-Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer Michael Howard. Saatchi argued for the simplification of the tax system and that the poorest eight million people in the United Kingdom should not pay income tax.^[5]

After Howard became leader of the Conservatives in November 2003, Saatchi was appointed joint chairman of the party with Liam Fox. He had responsibility for running the party campaign for the 2005 general election, after which he stepped down.^[6] He published his reflections on the election campaign in a Centre for Policy Studies pamphlet If this is Conservatism, I am a Conservative in a chapter entitled How I Lost the Election. Among his failings listed in the document, Saatchi highlighted the following:

• I DID NOT convince the Party that if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.
• I DID NOT dispel the illusion of research, which said that, as immigration was the number one issue in deciding how people vote, it should be the number one topic.
• I DID NOT prevent economics, the Conservatives' former ace of trumps, becoming a 'second order issue.'
• I DID NOT avoid the underestimation of public intelligence, as in the policy description 'Lower Taxes' when in fact taxes would be higher.

He recommended that future Conservative leaders establish a "moral purpose" as an ideology and future direction for the Party.^[7]

Other roles

He is also chairman of Finsbury Foods plc, and is a Governor of the London School of Economics from where he had graduated with a First class honours degree in Economics. Saatchi is a trustee of the Museum of Garden History, and also a director of the Centre for Policy Studies. He was also a trustee of the Victoria and Albert Museum from 1988 to 1996.

He is a previous recipient of the St. George’s Society Medal of Honour. An award established in 1996 which recognizes American and British industry leaders for significant contributions in the fields of business, finance and education.^[8]

Personal life

Saatchi's first wife was Gillian Osband, a children's book editor and writer whom he had had known since childhood and whom he married in 1972. They divorced in 1984 and that same year he married novelist Josephine Hart (1942-2011), whom he first met when they worked together at Haymarket Publications in 1967.^[5] She died on 2 July 2011.^[9]

His country property is a mock Tudor castle called Old Hall in Sussex built in 1842. There are sixty acres of parkland and ten acres of flowers, trees and lakes. Maurice Saatchi has a fondness for gardening, laid out the garden on the estate and built a conservatory to house semi-tropical plants. The property was the subject of a display article in the January 1995 issue of Architectural Digest.^[1]

Maurice Saatchi and his brother Charles were listed at number 366 in the Sunday Times Rich List 2008, with an estimated wealth of £220m in advertising and art.^[10] In the Sunday Times Rich List 2009 they were listed at number 438.^[11]

Bibliography

• Maurice Saatchi If this is Conservatism, I am a Conservative from the Centre for Policy Studies
• Goldman, Kevin Conflicting Accounts - The Creation & Crash of the Saatchi & Saatchi Empire, Simon & Schuster, New York, 1997. ISBN 0-684-83553-3

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d} Goldman - Conflicting Accounts
2. ^ Thomson, Alice; Rachel Sylvester (2009-02-28). "The Saturday interview: Charles Saatchi". London: Times Online. http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article5817312.ece. Retrieved 24 November 2009. 
3. ^ Jones, Chris (2002-07-12). "Charles Saatchi: Artful adman". BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk/2000/newsmakers/2124645.stm. Retrieved 24 November 2009. 
4. ^ Silk Cut Cigarette Advertisements.
5. ^ ^{a b c d} "Profile: Lord Saatchi". BBC News. 10 November 2003. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3256185.stm. Retrieved 2008-08-01. 
6. ^ Pierce, Andrew (1 August 2005). "Saatchi charges Tories £1.5m for failed campaign". London: The Times. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article550319.ece. Retrieved 2008-08-01. 
7. ^ "Saatchi: Why Tories lost election". BBC News. 20 June 2005. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4101940.stm. Retrieved 2008-08-01. 
8. ^ http://mnilive.com/?p=2938 St. George Medal of Honour
9. ^ Obituaries: Josephine Hart, The Telegraph, 3 July 2011
10. ^ Rich List: Maurice, Lord Saatchi and Charles Saatchi, The Sunday Times, 27 April 2008
11. ^ Rich List: Lord Saatchi and Charles Saatchi, The Sunday Times, 29 April 2011

External links

• Maurice Saatchi profile
• Profile at Parliament of the United Kingdom
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard 1803–2005
• Current session contributions in Parliament at Hansard
• Voting record at PublicWhip.org
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou.com
• Profile at BBC News Democracy Live
• Articles authored at Journalisted
• Business profile at Bloomberg Businessweek
• The Guardian Media Top 100 2001 number 44; 2002 number 47
• Works by or about Maurice Saatchi, Baron Saatchi in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

Party political offices
Preceded by Theresa May	Chairman of the Conservative Party 2003 – 2005 with Liam Fox	Succeeded by Francis Maude

Persondata
Name	Saatchi, Maurice
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	21 June 1946
Place of birth	Baghdad, Iraq
Date of death
Place of death