Jim O’Neill, the former Goldman Sachs chief economist who coined the phrase “Brics”, has been handed a Conservative peerage and a ministerial appointment in George Osborne’s new Treasury team.
Speaking in Manchester as he launched the latest phase of his “Northern Powerhouse” initiative, the chancellor said that O’Neill, who will be made a Conservative life peer, would be given special responsibility for driving forward devolution to cities outside London under the title of commercial secretary.
“Right in the heart of government, in the department that historically fought tooth and nail to stop giving up power, we have a brilliant new minister to help make devolution and the Northern Powerhouse happen,” the chancellor said.
O’Neill, who grew up in Gatley, on the southern outskirts of Manchester, is perhaps best known for coining the phrase “Brics”, to describe the rapid economic rise of Brazil, Russia, India and China, in 2001.
The post of commercial secretary was invented for another ex-City man, Sir James Sassoon. A Treasury spokeswoman said details of O’Neill’s responsibilities would be announced shortly; past commercial secretaries have overseen infrastructure projects, regulation and foreign investment, among other policy areas.
Most recently he has chaired a government-commissioned study into ways to tackle the problem of antibiotic resistance. But he previously oversaw the City Growth Commission, under the auspices of the Royal Society of Arts.
The commission’s final report, published in 2013, called for fresh powers to be handed to cities, including the right to retain far more of their local tax revenues.
O’Neill also coined the phrase “Manpool” to suggest an agglomeration of Manchester and Liverpool’s economies into a powerful bloc – and recommended prioritising faster transport connections between a series of northern cities.
The new minister has expressed scepticism about HS2, the government’s costly plan to upgrade train links to northern cities. He told the Observer in 2014: “I’d put it down as a nice luxury. It’s not obvious to me that it’s going to be useful to the north or the Midlands because all it guarantees is that people can get to London quicker than they can now.”
O’Neill worked at Goldman Sachs from 1995 to 2013 and was its chief economist for much of that time. He studied at Sheffield and Surrey Universities, and is currently the honorary chair of economics at Manchester University.
Russell Jones, of Lle00wellyn Consulting, who knows O’Neill well, said, “as an economist, Jim is eclectic and very sensible. What he will bring to the Treasury – and they need this – is loads of experience of the markets. He’s got that in spades.”