Anthony Browne (born 19 January 1967) is Policy Director for Economic Development for Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London.[1] He is in charge of economic and business policy for London, and sits on the board of the London Development Agency,[2] and is an observer on the boards of the London Skills and Employment Board, and theCityUK, which represents UK financial services. He is also chairman of the Mayor's Digital Advisory Board.
He was previously Director of Policy Exchange, the largest centre-right think tank in the UK, where he succeeded the founding director Nick Boles. He ran Policy Exchange for eighteen months, during which time it doubled in size, but attracted criticism that it came too close to Conservative leader David Cameron.[3] Before that, he was a national journalist: business reporter and economics correspondent for the BBC; economics correspondent, health editor and environment correspondent for the Observer newspaper; and environment editor, Europe correspondent, and chief political correspondent for the Times. When Europe correspondent for the Times, he covered the enlargement of the EU to Eastern Europe, and the appointment of Peter Mandelson as European Commissioner. He also reported for the Times from Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein, and has been a regular contributor to the Spectator magazine and the Daily Mail. He has a weekly column in City AM.
He has written and contributed to various publications, including a book on whether Britain should join the European single currency, which entered the Sunday Times best-seller list; a Civitas pamphlet on mass immigration, which won Prospect magazine's think tank publication of the year award in 2003; and a Joseph Rowntree Foundation book on social evils. He is on the advisory board of the New Culture Forum,[4] and the think tank ResPublica.