John Hoskyns
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- For the 17th century miniature painter, see John Hoskins
Sir John Hoskyns (born August 1927) is best known as an Policy Advisor to Margaret Thatcher while head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit from May 1979 and April 1982. Prior to this he acted as a Policy Adviser to her and the Shadow Cabinet from 1975-79, during which time he produced the important "Stepping Stones" report of November 1977.
He was educated at Winchester College before serving as a regular soldier in the Rifle Brigade (1945-57). He then started a business career at IBM UK Ltd (1957-64), before founding the Hoskyns Group Ltd where he was Chairman and Managing Director (1964-75). He was Director-General of the Institute of Directors (1984-89), and served on the boards of a number of public companies.
Without any political experience, he dedicated a year to analysing what he considered to be wrong with the UK, putting this down in a diagram that showed how all these problems were interlinked. When Margaret Thatcher saw this diagram, having studied chemistry, she remarked it looked like a chemical plant.
He was knighted in 1982 and published a memoir, "Just in time, inside the Thatcher revolution" in 2000.
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