Rupert Pennant-Rea

The son of Peter Athelwold and Pauline Pennant-Rea, he was educated at the Peterhouse Boys' School, an Anglican church boarding school near Marandellas, Rhodesia (now Marondera, Zimbabwe), before attending Trinity College, Dublin,[1] and Manchester University,[1] where he received his MA degree. He has been married several times,[2] and has three children and one step-daughter. At one time his wife was Helen Jay, one of the twin daughters of Labour Party politicians Peggy Jay and Douglas Jay.[3]

Pennant-Rea joined the Bank of England in 1973 and remained until 1977, when he left to work for The Economist magazine.[1] He was the magazine's editor from 1986 until 1993.[4] Between 1993 and 1995, he again joined the Bank of England as Deputy Governor of the bank, under the governorship of Edward George;[1] he resigned following reports of an extramarital affair with Mary Ellen Synon, whom he had met at Trinity College, Dublin.[2]

In 1994 he became a member of the influential Washington-based financial advisory body, the Group of Thirty.

In 1995 he became a director of a Canadian mining company, Sherritt International[5] In March 1996, he was banned from the USA (along with his wife at the time and under-age children) because of Sherritt's commercial interests in Cuba, under the terms of the USA's Helms-Burton Act.

Pennant-Rea was chairman of The Stationery Office following its privatisation in 1996.[6] He was a British American Tobacco director from 1998 to 2007. He was also Chairman of Henderson Group and a non-executive director of several companies such as Go-Ahead Group, a transport company, First Quantum and Gold Fields, both mining companies.

In July 2009, Pennant-Rea was appointed non-executive chairman of The Economist Group, having served as a non-executive director since August 2006.. In July 2018, after nine years, he was succeeded by Paul Deighton. He was Chairman of Royal London,[7] and Chairman of PGI, an agriculture company. He was a National Independent director of Times Newspapers.[8] Pennant-Rea recently is advising new businesses and start-ups related to greenhouse gases reduction.

In the non-profit sector, Pennant-Rea is a trustee of the Marjorie Deane Foundation. He was a trustee of Speakers Trust,[9] the UK's leading public-speaking training charity and Chairman of the Shakespeare Schools Festival. Pennant-Rea has written a series of books about economics and a novel, Gold Foil.