Peter Gummer, Baron Chadlington

Peter Selwyn Gummer, Baron Chadlington ( born August 24, 1942) is a British businessman and politician.

Life and career

Gummer was born on August 24, 1942, the son of Selwyn Gummer, a clergyman of the Church of England, and his wife Margaret born. Gummer has two brothers, John Gummer, Baron Deben, former Chairman of the Conservative Party, and Mark Selwyn Gummer. He studied at Selwyn College ( Cambridge ), human sciences and theology with the aim to become a priest after he among other things philosophical works had read of Albert Camus, he changed his goal. He graduated as Master of Arts and became a journalist.

Career

During his journalistic work in a business editor, he noted that the work is in the industry more attractive than the journalism and he moved his activities. After several years in various companies he founded the public relations firm Shandwick of which he was in 1974.

Within seven years Shandwick was the largest PR company in the UK and in 1984 converted into a public limited company. 1984, the company was sold to Interpublic Group of Companies and is now part of Huntworth group.

He was first Chairman of Huntworth and should be his successor after the resignation of CEO Richard Nichols. Gummer resigned on 12 May 2005 and did not attend the post on the board.

In addition to his work in the field of public relations he was a Director at Britax, director of the Halifax Bank and a visiting professor at the University of Gloucestershire. He was a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, the Institute of Directors, the Chartered Institute of Marketing and the Royal Society of Arts. In September 1996, Gummer was Director General of the Royal Opera House. On the occasion of a report of the Culture Media and Sport Committee of the House of Commons which described the management of the Royal Opera House as an abyss of Imkompetenz, disastrous financial planning and bad decisions, Gummer laid in December 1997, down from his position. On October 16, 1996, he was appointed Life Peer and received the title of Baron Chadlington.