Arms
  |
|
The Lord Bamford | |
|---|---|
| Chairman of J.C. Bamford Excavators | |
| Assumed office 1975 | |
| Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal | |
| In office 3 October 2013 –1 March 2024 Life peerage | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Anthony Paul Bamford 23 October 1945 [1] Staffordshire,England [2] |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Spouse | Carole Whitt |
| Children | 3,including Jo |
| Parent |
|
| Education | Ampleforth College |
| Alma mater | University of Grenoble |
| Occupation | Businessman |
Anthony Paul Bamford, Baron Bamford, DL , HonFREng (born 23 October 1945), is a British billionaire businessman who is the chairman of J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB). He succeeded his father, Joseph Cyril Bamford, as chairman and managing director of the company in 1975, at the age of 30. He was knighted in 1990. [3] Bamford has appeared in the Sunday Times Rich List , [4] and in 2021 his net worth was estimated at US$9.48 billion. [5] Bamford is a car collector whose collection includes two examples of the rare Ferrari 250 GTO, valued upwards of $70 million each.
Bamford was educated at Ampleforth College, followed by the University of Grenoble. [6]
In 1974, Bamford sued the then MP Jeffrey Archer for bankruptcy after Archer failed to repay a £172,000 loan. Archer had lost the money in a fraudulent share scam. Archer later repaid the money from his earnings as a novelist and Bamford subsequently withdrew the bankruptcy notice. [7]
In 2000, JCB was fined £22 million by the European Commission for antitrust breaches. Bamford said the decision was "disappointing and wrong". [8] [9] A six-year legal battle ensued, which resulted in the European Court of Justice upholding the penalty. [10]
Outside of business, Bamford is a well-known collector of early vintage Ferraris, [11] and is the only individual to own two Ferrari 250 GTOs. [12] He was once the owner of a 1954 Mercedes-Benz W196 Grand Prix car raced by the five-time world champion Juan Manuel Fangio of Argentina, [13] and in August 2006, he expressed an interest in purchasing Jaguar Cars [14] but backed out when he was told the sale would also involve Land Rover, which he did not wish to buy.
A few months before Bamford joined the House of Lords, he shut down a company he had owned that was registered in the British Virgin Islands, a tax haven according to the Panama Papers. The company was called Casper Ltd. and was formed in 1994. Bamford was the sole shareholder. A spokesman for Bamford told The Guardian in 2016 that Casper Ltd. never owned any assets, had a bank account or engaged in any activity during its entire existence. [15]
In 2014 Bamford was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. [16]
Bamford is a major donor to the UK Conservative Party, with JCB and related Bamford entities giving the party £8.1m in cash or kind between 2007 and 2017. [17]
He donated £1 million before the 2010 General Election, and Prime Minister David Cameron recommended him for a peerage that same year, however Bamford withdrew his name from consideration days before the members were announced. [18] Between 2001 and 2010, JCB Research, a reportedly "obscure" [19] and little known company that was incorporated by Bamford in 1961, [20] donated over £4.5 million to Conservative politicians, although it was only reportedly worth £27,000 at the end of 2010. [19]
In 2012, Bamford was later outspoken on the need for the UK Government to champion manufacturing in the UK and commissioned a report in 2012 on the subject which was sent directly to David Cameron. [21] He was elevated to the House of Lords in August 2013, [22] when he took the title Baron Bamford of Daylesford in the County of Gloucestershire and of Wootton in the County of Staffordshire. [23]
In June 2016, Bamford wrote a letter in support of voting to leave the European Union to his employees. [24] In October 2016, he led his company to leave the CBI over the organisation's anti-Brexit stance. [25] JCB also donated £100,000 to Vote Leave, the official pro-Brexit group. [25] In May 2021, Bamford rejected an invitation to rejoin the CBI, after previously having called it a "waste of time" that "didn’t represent my business or private companies". [26] [27]
During the 2019 general election campaign, Bamford donated £3,935,984 to the Conservative Party. [28]
In 2023 New Statesman named Bamford the 33rd most powerful right-wing political figure in the UK, writing that he "collects [both] cars and politicians". [29]
Bamford owns mansions in several countries; in England, they include Daylesford House and Wootton Lodge. [30] Although he was linked to offshore tax havens in the Panama Papers through sole ownership of Casper Ltd., his spokesman said the company was inactive for its entire existence before being dissolved in 2012. [31]
Bamford is married to Carole Whitt and they have 3 children, Joseph "Jo" Cyril Edward, George, and Alice. [32] Jo Bamford is also a businessman who founded a green hydrogen investment fund [33] after working at the family company. [34] In 2019 Jo purchased Northern Irish company Wrightbus, which manufactures buses, including London's double-deckers. [35] [36]
Bamford is close to King Charles III [37] as well as former Prime Ministers Sir Tony Blair and Boris Johnson, having provided Daylesford House for Johnson's wedding party in July 2022, [38] along with £23,853 towards costs. [39]
With his wife, Bamford was invited to ride in the King's procession at Royal Ascot 2023. [40]
Lord Bamford retired from the House of Lords in March 2024.
Bamford is a prolific car collector with an interest in rare vintage Ferraris. His car collection is valued in excess of £260 million[ citation needed ] and includes: [41]
| |
|
The Ferrari 250 GTO is a grand tourer produced by Ferrari from 1962 to 1964 for homologation into the FIA's Group 3 Grand Touring Car category. It was powered by Ferrari's Tipo 168/62 Colombo V12 engine. The "250" in its name denotes the displacement in cubic centimeters of each of its cylinders; "GTO" stands for Gran Turismo Omologato, Italian for "Grand Touring Homologated".
J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB) is a British multinational manufacturer of equipment for construction, agriculture, waste handling, and demolition. It was founded in 1945 and is based in Rocester, Staffordshire, England.
Wrightbus is a Northern Ireland-based bus manufacturer and a pioneer of the low-floor bus. The company was established in 1946 by Robert Wright and was later run by his son William Wright, until it was acquired in 2019 by British businessman Jo Bamford.
The Ferrari 250 is a series of sports cars and grand tourers built by Ferrari from 1952 to 1964. The company's most successful early line, the 250 series includes many variants designed for road use or sports car racing. 250 series cars are characterized by their use of a 3.0 L (2,953 cc) Colombo V12 engine designed by Gioacchino Colombo. They were replaced by the 275 and 330 series cars.
Joseph Cyril Bamford, CBE was a British businessman. He was the founder of J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB), a manufacturer of heavy equipment.
Giotto Bizzarrini was an Italian automobile engineer who was active from the 1950s through the 1970s.
The Ferrari 250 GT SWB Breadvan is a one-off Ferrari made in 1962 from a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB, chassis number 2819 GT. It was built to compete against the new 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO at the 24 Hours of Le Mans and other FIA World Sportscar Championship races.
Charles Lamb Allen, Baron Allen of Kensington, is a British businessman, broadcaster, and chairman of Balfour Beatty, Invictus Games THG plc, Global Radio and Advisory chairman at Moelis & Company. Lord Allen was chief executive of Granada Group from 1996 to 2000, executive chairman of Granada Media plc from 2000 to 2004, chief executive of ITV plc from its formation in 2004 until 2007, and chairman of the music company EMI. He was chairman of Endemol, 2 Sisters Food Group and ISS, a non-executive director of Tesco and Virgin Media. In March 2012, he was appointed by Ed Miliband, the leader of the Labour Party, to the position of chairman of the executive board of the party. He has been chairman of the British Red Cross.
The TaxPayers' Alliance (TPA) is a pressure group in the United Kingdom which was formed in 2004 to campaign for a low-tax society. The group had about 18,000 registered supporters as of 2008 and claimed to have 55,000 by September 2010. However, it has been suggested that a vast majority of these supporters – who do not contribute financially or engage in campaigning – were simply signed up to a mailing list.
Sir Jacob William Rees-Mogg is a British politician and member of the Conservative Party serving as the Member of Parliament (MP) for North East Somerset since 2010. He served as Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council from 2019 to 2022, Minister of State for Brexit Opportunities and Government Efficiency from February to September 2022 and Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy from September to October 2022. Rees-Mogg previously chaired the eurosceptic European Research Group (ERG) from 2018 to 2019 and has been associated with socially conservative views.
Daylesford is a small, privately owned village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Adlestrop, in the Cotswold district, in the county of Gloucestershire, England, on the border with Oxfordshire. It is situated just south of the A436 two miles east of Stow-on-the-Wold and five miles west of Chipping Norton. The village is on the north bank of the small River Evenlode. This area falls within the Cotswold Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, so designated in 1966. In 1931 the parish had a population of 82.
Jeremy John Hosking is a British businessman and political donor. Ranked number 351 in the Sunday Times Rich List 2019, with a net worth of £375 million, he is a shareholder in Crystal Palace F.C. and a noted railway enthusiast. He has donated heavily to the Reclaim Party.
The Chipping Norton set is a group of media, political and show-business acquaintances who have homes near the market town of Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire, England. Chipping Norton is located approximately 75 miles from London. The group gained media attention in the wake of the News International phone hacking scandal, which directly involved members of the group.
Alexander Viktorovich Temerko is a Ukrainian businessman in the energy sector, currently a director of the British company Aquind Limited. Previously, he was director and deputy chairman of the British company OGN Group. While in Russia, he held senior posts in the Russian Defence Ministry in the 1990s and, from 1999, was a senior executive and director at the Russian oil and gas company Yukos. He has resided in the United Kingdom since 2004. He became a British citizen in 2011.
Peter Andrew Cruddas, Baron Cruddas is an English banker and businessman. He is the founder of online trading company CMC Markets. In the 2007 Sunday Times Rich List, he was named the richest man in the City of London, with an estimated fortune of £860 million. As of March 2012, Forbes estimated his wealth at $1.3 billion, equivalent to £830 million at the time.
Carole Gray Bamford, Baroness Bamford, OBE, is a British businessperson who founded the Daylesford Organic Farmshops chain and the Bamford brand of women's products.
Arron Fraser Andrew Banks is a British businessman and political donor. He is the co-founder of the Leave.EU campaign. Banks was previously one of the largest donors to the UK Independence Party (UKIP) and helped Nigel Farage's campaign for Britain to leave the EU.
Vote Leave was a campaigning organisation that supported a "Leave" vote in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum. On 13 April 2016 it was designated by the Electoral Commission as the official campaign in favour of leaving the European Union in the Referendum.
Labour Leave is a Eurosceptic campaign group in the United Kingdom. The group is unofficially affiliated with the Labour Party, and campaigned for the United Kingdom to vote to withdraw from the European Union, in the June 2016 EU Referendum. The group was led by eurosceptic Labour MPs: Graham Stringer, Kelvin Hopkins, and Roger Godsiff.
Joseph Cyril Edward Bamford is a British businessman. He is the owner of Wrightbus, a UK-based bus manufacturer.
