25 Facts About Richard Mottram

Sir Richard Clive Mottram was born on 23 April 1946 and is a former British civil servant, who retired in 2007 from his most recent senior post as Permanent Secretary, Intelligence, Security and Resilience in the Cabinet Office.

Richard Mottram is chair of the advisory board of the LSE's foreign policy think tank and lectures on its Executive Masters course and other LSE courses.

Richard Mottram is a trustee of the Royal Anniversary Trust, which oversees The Queen's Anniversary Prizes for Higher and Further Education.

Richard Mottram entered the central government civil service in 1968 aged 22 with a first class degree in International relations from Keele University.

Richard Mottram was then the secretary of two study groups on the rationale for and system options for a successor to the UK's strategic nuclear deterrent which led subsequently to the decision to adopt Trident.

Richard Mottram was then appointed private secretary to the permanent under secretary, MOD: Sir Frank Cooper.

Richard Mottram was Heseltine's Private Secretary at the time of his resignation in 1986 over the Westland affair.

Richard Mottram's term saw the rail crashes at Ladbroke Grove, Hatfield and Potters Bar.

Richard Mottram was closely involved in the preparations for the administration of Railtrack and in July 2005 was called as a witness in the largest class legal action ever brought in the English courts, when 49,500 shareholders of Railtrack sued the Secretary of State for Transport for damages for misfeasance in public office.

Richard Mottram was still at the DETR in 2002 when, after further controversy over alleged "burying of bad news" involving Moore and Martin Sixsmith, the department's Director of Communications, Stephen Byers announced that both Moore and Sixsmith had decided to resign.

Richard Mottram was in the middle of negotiations with Sixsmith at the time of the Byers announcement.

Sir Richard Mottram was embarrassed by the report of his remarks, and was asked about them by the House of Commons Public Administration Committee on 7 March 2002.

Sir Richard Mottram has worked closely with a large number of Ministers and took the impartiality and professionalism of the civil service very seriously.

Richard Mottram later said that he realised that this analogy was a "tremendous mistake".

In May 2002, as Stephen Byers resigned as secretary of state, Richard Mottram was moved to the Department for Work and Pensions as permanent secretary.

Sir Richard Mottram moved to a strategic position at the Cabinet Office on 11 November 2005 as Security and Intelligence Co-ordinator.

Richard Mottram took on the role of chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee.

Richard Mottram's post was retitled as Permanent Secretary Intelligence, Security, and Resilience, Cabinet Office.

Richard Mottram acted as deputy chair of the Civil Contingencies Committee, supporting the prime minister, home secretary and other ministers in their role as chair and, in the event of any serious incident requiring central government coordination, acting as the Government's senior crisis manager.

Richard Mottram was responsible for co-ordination of the Government's counter-terrorism policy and programmes.

Richard Mottram was made chair of the Joint Intelligence Committee at time when the credibility of the organisation needed to be re-established after intelligence reports were apparently "sexed-up" for PR purposes during the chairmanship of John Scarlett.

Sir Richard Mottram retired from the Civil Service in November 2007 when the responsibilities he held were reorganised into two posts, with the Cabinet Secretary taking on the Accounting Officer role for the Intelligence Agencies.

Sir Richard Mottram served as a Board Member and then from 2002 to 2004 President of the Commonwealth Association for Public Administration and Management.

Richard Mottram was a Board Member of Ashridge Business School from 1998- 2015.

Richard Mottram was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in the 1998 New Year Honours and promoted to a Knight Grand Cross of the same Order in the 2006 New Year Honours.