83 Facts About Zac Goldsmith

Frank Zacharias Robin Goldsmith, Baron Goldsmith of Richmond Park, was born on 20 January 1975 and is a British politician, life peer and journalist serving as Minister of State for Overseas Territories, Commonwealth, Energy, Climate and Environment since 2022.

In 1998, his uncle Edward Zac Goldsmith made him editor of The Ecologist, a position he retained until 2007.

Zac Goldsmith was appointed Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Quality of Life Policy Group in 2005, co-authoring its report published in 2007.

Zac Goldsmith was placed on the Conservative A-List of potential candidates in 2006 and, in March 2007, was selected through an open primary to contest the constituency of Richmond Park against incumbent Liberal Democrat MP Susan Kramer.

At the 2015 general election, Zac Goldsmith was returned to the Commons with a majority of 23,015, an increase of almost 19,000 votes since 2010, against his nearest opponent.

Zac Goldsmith was chosen as the Conservative candidate for the 2016 election for mayor of London, which he subsequently lost to Sadiq Khan of the Labour Party.

Zac Goldsmith announced his resignation as an MP following the government's decision in October 2016 to approve construction of a third runway at Heathrow Airport.

Zac Goldsmith's resignation triggered a by-election in the Richmond Park constituency in which Goldsmith stood as an independent candidate.

Zac Goldsmith was defeated by Sarah Olney of the Liberal Democrats with a majority of 1,872 votes.

Zac Goldsmith was made Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment and International Development on 27 July 2019 and was promoted to Minister of State with the right to attend Cabinet on 10 September 2019.

Zac Goldsmith was defeated at the 2019 general election, again by Sarah Olney, with a majority of 7,766 votes.

Zac Goldsmith was born on 20 January 1975 at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in Chelsea, London.

Zac Goldsmith is the middle child of Sir James Goldsmith, a member of the Goldsmith family of German Jewish and French descent, and his third wife, the Anglo-Irish aristocrat, Lady Annabel Vane-Tempest-Stewart, the daughter of The 8th Marquess of Londonderry.

Zac Goldsmith is half-brother to Robin and India Jane Birley, his mother's children from her first marriage.

Zac Goldsmith later recalled, "Zac Goldsmith was my hero, and it was his work that made me fall in love with the natural world".

Zac Goldsmith was educated at four independent schools: King's House School in Richmond and The Mall School in Twickenham, followed by Hawtreys School, near Great Bedwyn in Wiltshire, and Eton College in Berkshire; he was expelled from Eton after drugs were found in his room.

Zac Goldsmith travelled throughout the world with the International Honours Programme, including to Thailand, New Zealand, Mexico, Hungary and Italy.

In 1997, Zac Goldsmith was appointed reviews editor of The Ecologist by his uncle Edward Zac Goldsmith, the magazine's founding editor, owner and publisher.

Zac Goldsmith relaunched The Ecologist on 28 March 2000 in a new format, transforming its academic journal-style into a current affairs-magazine format, thereby broadening its appeal and trebling its circulation.

Zac Goldsmith had previously supported the election campaigns of Michael Gove and Joanne Cash.

Zac Goldsmith stated he regarded Labour as "the party of big business" which had become shaped by big lobbying groups and which had become too authoritarian and centrist.

Zac Goldsmith thought highly of Cameron, expressing the view that while he was generally "cynical about politicians", he felt that Cameron was different.

Zac Goldsmith felt uneasy about representing this constituency, with which he had no previous connection, and thus pulled out to avoid carpetbagging.

Zac Goldsmith then entered the Richmond Park Conservative Association's open primary, which he won in March 2007.

In 2007, Zac Goldsmith opposed the opening of a superstore by supermarket chain Sainsbury's in Barnes.

Zac Goldsmith spearheaded a referendum conducted by the Electoral Reform Society to poll local residents on the issue, working closely with a local campaign group.

In late 2009, the press asserted that Zac Goldsmith had non-domiciled status and that as a London resident, albeit a discretionary beneficiary, he had use of British properties through a trust set up by his late father.

Zac Goldsmith responded, in a statement about the suggestion of tax avoidance, that he has "always chosen to be tax resident in the UK" and virtually all his income was paid into British banks.

Zac Goldsmith organised a rally attended by over 1,000 people in the royal park on 30 January 2010 in conjunction with other local Conservatives to protest the proposed charging.

Zac Goldsmith achieved an increase of 8.5 percent of the share of the vote from the 2010 general election, receiving a total of 58.2 percent of all votes cast by his constituents.

In July 2010, Channel 4 News questioned whether Zac Goldsmith had under-reported the sums spent on signs, stickers and jackets used in his campaign and claimed his campaign spending was much higher than other MPs they investigated.

Zac Goldsmith insisted he had followed the same procedures as other candidates and countered by stating Channel 4 engaged in sleazy unethical journalism.

Zac Goldsmith responded that it had been "checked" and was "standard practice" across the country.

Zac Goldsmith clashed with presenter Jon Snow, who accused him of "prevaricating" in a confrontational live interview on Channel 4 News.

Snow suggested Zac Goldsmith take the matter to OFCOM, which rejected Zac Goldsmith's complaint about Snow and Channel 4 News' conduct.

In December 2015, Zac Goldsmith voted in support of the government's plans to expand the aerial bombing of Islamic State targets.

Zac Goldsmith endorsed a government bill that would have restricted trade unions in their ability to strike.

Zac Goldsmith knows that if there's a policy I don't support, I will stand my ground.

Zac Goldsmith initially ruled out standing as a candidate in the 2016 London mayoral election, stating that "I think people have had quite enough of white male Etonians".

On 9 June 2015, Zac Goldsmith announced his interest in running for the mayoralty of London after encouragement both from members of his own party and others.

Zac Goldsmith stated that he was confident that the Cameron government would reject Heathrow expansion but that if they did not then he would resign as an MP and trigger a by-election.

In July 2015, he condemned the Airports Commission report written by the economist Howard Davies which backed Heathrow expansion; Zac Goldsmith claimed that Davies had already decided on his conclusion before producing the three-year study.

Davies responded by alleging that Zac Goldsmith was lying, but the latter stood by his claim, as evidence citing that information he supplied to Davies' commission was not taken seriously.

Zac Goldsmith went against prevailing opinion in London by welcoming foreign investment into the property market, arguing that this investment could help to finance more house building.

Zac Goldsmith ruled out supporting development on London's Green belt, although stated that option might need to be considered in ten or fifteen years hence if the city's population continued to rise.

Zac Goldsmith suggested an expansion of the London congestion zone, and endorsed Boris Johnson's plans to construct a Garden Bridge across the River Thames.

Zac Goldsmith hired Lynton Crosby's company to run his campaign and appointed Mark Fulbrook as his campaign director.

Zac Goldsmith's campaign emphasised connections between London Labour candidate Sadiq Khan and newly elected socialist Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, despite Khan's own attempts to distance himself from Corbyn.

Zac Goldsmith strongly denied claims his campaign had been racist and accused his rival Khan of 'playing the race card'.

Zac Goldsmith went on to lose the election to Sadiq Khan in the second round by 315,529 votes.

Zac Goldsmith's campaign was later criticised by Labour MP David Lammy for being "divisive" by focusing on attempts to link Khan to Islamist extremists.

Zac Goldsmith had promised, as far back as a June 2012 edition of the BBC's Sunday Politics programme, he would not stand as a Conservative candidate at the next election if the Conservative Party backed the expansion of Heathrow Airport, an issue to which he was strongly opposed.

Zac Goldsmith stood as an independent instead of as a Conservative but was endorsed by UKIP who did not stand a candidate.

Zac Goldsmith lost to Sarah Olney of the Liberal Democrats, who overturned his majority of 23,000.

Zac Goldsmith regained the constituency as a Conservative candidate but winning with a majority of just 45 votes, the fifth-slimmest in the election.

Zac Goldsmith appeared at number 98 on the 'Top 100 Most Influential Conservatives of 2019' by LBC's Iain Dale.

On 7 January 2020, Zac Goldsmith was created Baron Zac Goldsmith of Richmond Park, of Richmond Park in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames.

However, Labour MP and former Shadow Environment Secretary Kerry McCarthy said she believed Zac Goldsmith was committed to the government's promise to maintain standards in environmental regulation after Brexit, adding: "because of that I welcome the fact that he is still around to carry on and do that work".

In Boris Johnson's post-Brexit reshuffle, Zac Goldsmith was given the additional role of Minister of State for Foreign Affairs with responsibility for the Pacific.

On 1 June 2020, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards concluded Zac Goldsmith had breached the standards commission's code of conduct by his use of publicly-funded stationery and postage for political purposes around 1 November 2019, shortly before the 2019 general election.

In September 2022, Zac Goldsmith was appointed Minister of State for Asia, Energy, Climate and Environment by Liz Truss.

Zac Goldsmith was reappointed by Rishi Sunak with new responsibilities for overseas territories and the Commonwealth.

Journalist Dave Hill noted that the "young Zac Goldsmith was pro-small business and small communities, localist and conservationist" and was "against overbearing government from whatever the source".

Zac Goldsmith has spoken and written about environmental causes in Britain and has twice been invited to debate at the Oxford Union, where he has delivered keynote addresses.

Zac Goldsmith reflects on the culture of tribal people and, in reverence to it, urges people in the modern world to question what "progress" can really mean.

Zac Goldsmith believes that direct democracy would help combat feelings of disenfranchisement among people and increase accountability.

Zac Goldsmith has argued in favour of introducing measures so that MPs can be subject to recall referendums midway through their term if a sufficiently large number of their constituents petition for it.

Zac Goldsmith first announced he was in favour of the UK leaving the European Union in 2013 and has consistently voted against UK membership of the EU in Parliament.

Less than 24 hours after the 2017 Barcelona attacks, Zac Goldsmith shared his brother's controversial post on social media which compared ISIS's antisemitism to that of the left-wing British campaign group Momentum.

Zac Goldsmith funded the Organic Targets Bill Campaign to promote organic farming in 1999.

Zac Goldsmith has been a member of the advisory board of the JMG Foundation, which disburses grants globally to a range of environmental advocacy groups using the financial legacy left by James Goldsmith.

Zac Goldsmith is on the National Gardens Scheme's Council of Trustees as one of four Ambassadors.

Zac Goldsmith is a Patron of the Mihai Eminescu Trust which conserves and maintains communities in Transylvania and the Maramures, and the philanthropic organization, Fortune Forum.

Zac Goldsmith is a longstanding donor to the Soil Association.

Zac Goldsmith has been described as having a "soft voice and unhurried manner".

Zac Goldsmith was married for ten years to Sheherazade Ventura-Bentley with whom he has three children: two daughters, Uma Romaine and Thyra, and one son, James.

The Zac Goldsmith couple separated in April 2009, and received a decree nisi on 10 May 2010.

Sheherazade and Zac Goldsmith were featured in Vanity Fair 67th Annual International Best-Dressed List among "Best-Dressed Couples".

Zac Goldsmith said in 2000 that he wore Savile Row suits which had belonged to his late father.

Zac Goldsmith married banking heiress Alice Rothschild in 2013 at London Wetland Centre in his constituency.

Alice's sister, Kate Rothschild, and his brother, Ben Zac Goldsmith, had been married until 2012.

Zac Goldsmith's grandfathers were both Conservative Members of Parliament: his paternal grandfather, Frank Goldsmith, was a Conservative MP, while his mother's father, The 8th Marquess of Londonderry, represented County Down as a Unionist MP in the British House of Commons, when he was still styled Viscount Castlereagh.

Zac Goldsmith's maternal great-grandfather, The 7th Marquess of Londonderry, was an Ulster Unionist politician.