Michael Jay, Baron Jay of Ewelme

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Michael Hastings Jay, Baron Jay of Ewelme, GCMG (born June 1946) is a former senior civil servant in the United Kingdom.

Jay was born in Hampshire and educated at Winchester College, Magdalen College, Oxford, of which he is an honorary fellow, and London University's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).

After voluntary service as a teacher in Zambia, he joined the Ministry of Overseas Development in 1969, serving in London, Washington (at the World Bank) and in the British High Commission in New Delhi. In 1981 he joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. He served in the European Secretariat of the Cabinet Office 1985–87, as Counsellor in the Paris Embassy 1987–90, and in the Foreign Office as Director for European Affairs, then Director General for European and Economic Affairs 1990–96. In 1996 he was a Senior Associate Member of St Antony's College, Oxford. From July 1996 to September 2001 he was British Ambassador to France.

In July 2001 he was appointed Permanent Under-Secretary (PUS) at the Foreign Office and thus Head of the Diplomatic Service, a post he took up on 14 January 2002.

In 2005, Sir Michael Jay served as the Prime Minister's Personal Representative (Sherpa) to prepare the G8 Summit at Gleneagles in addition to his PUS duties.

Upon his retirement from the Foreign Office on 27 July 2006, he was recommended for a life peerage, and this was gazetted as Baron Jay of Ewelme, of Ewelme in the County of Oxfordshire, on 18 September 2006.

Jay married Sylvia Mylroie in 1975. Lady Jay of Ewelme has been vice chairwoman of L'Oreal UK since September 2005, Chairman of Food From Britain since January 2006, and is an independent non-executive director of St-Gobain. She also chairs the Pilgrim Trust and is a trustee of the Entente Cordiale Scholarship Scheme.