Rt Hon Steven John Baker FRSA
Born, 6 June 1971, Cornwall. Married, 1996.
Political & Parliamentary Experience
Conservative MP, Wycombe, May 2010 – 2024
Elected May 2010. Member of first the Transport Select Committee and later the Treasury Committee. Served on the Conservative 1922 Committee Executive. Co-Chaired Conservatives for Britain.
Minister of State (Cabinet Office), February 2024 – July 2024
Appointed February 2024 to carry through the implementation of the Windsor Framework and Safeguarding the Union across Government.
Minister of State (Northern Ireland Office), September 2022 – July 2024
Appointed September 2022. Reset the relationship with Ireland and thereby the EU, enabling a compromise settlement of the issue of the border on the Island of Ireland.
Chair of the Steering Group, Net Zero Scrutiny Group, October 2021 – September 2022
Established the Net Zero Scrutiny Group and served as Chair of the Steering Group.
Deputy Chairman, COVID Recovery Group, November 2020 – September 2022
Established and served as Deputy Chairman of the COVID Recovery Group.
Chair, European Research Group, November 2016 – June 2017; September 2019 – February 2020
Twice appointed Chair of the European Research Group. Served as Deputy Chair from 2018–2019.
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Exiting the European Union), June 2017 – July 2018
Appointed June 2017 with responsibility for preparedness and legislation across all of Government.
Executive Member, 1922 Committee, May 2012 – June 2017
Elected May 2012 to represent colleagues in Parliament.
Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate, Wycombe, October 2009 – May 2010
Selected as Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Wycombe on 31 October 2009 at my first appearance before a selection meeting.
Corporate Affairs Director, The Cobden Centre, 2009 – May 2010
Established The Cobden Centre with Chairman and Founder Toby Baxendale as an educational charity to promote social progress through honest money, free trade and peace.
Associate Consultant, Centre for Social Justice, 2008 – 2010
Assisted The Centre for Social Justice on a voluntary basis with the development of implementation plans. At Conservative Party Conference 2009, chaired the CSJ/Smith Institute fringe debates on the bank bailouts, housing and insolvency.
Professional Experience
Principal, Ambriel Consulting Ltd, 2001 – 2010
Running a successful consulting software engineering business, serving software developers, corporations, regulators and government, specializing in technologies for interoperable data.
Chief Architect, Global Financing and Asset Servicing Platforms, Lehman Brothers, London, 2006 – 2008
Instrumental in forming the strategy and design for the global financing programme, supporting the multi-million dollar securities lending business. Also central to determining the strategy for the critical function of maintaining, and controlling the risk associated with, many billions of dollars of assets under management.
My work at Lehman Brothers particularly informs my work on reforming the financial system.
Director of Product Development, CoreFiling Ltd, 2005 – 2006
Envisioning, specifying and delivering products and services in electronic financial reporting to clients including BusinessWire, the SEC, the National Bank of Belgium, Altria, PepsiCo and Reuters. CoreFiling was a sister company to DecisionSoft.
Chief Technology Officer, BASDA Ltd, Great Missenden, 2002 – 2007
Representing and setting standards for the business application software development industry. Enabling collaboration between competitors to deliver value to the Office of Government Commerce, HMRC, the house- building industry and others. Operating at UK board level with international software vendors.
Head of Consulting and Product Manager, DecisionSoft Ltd, 2000 – 2001
Leading a team delivering early e-government systems, enabling online services which have been developed and remain vital today.
Engineer Officer (Aerosystems), Royal Air Force, 1989 – 1999
A University Cadetship followed by three tours of duty working internationally in connection with Tornado F3, Jaguar and the Adour gas turbine, which is fitted to Hawk, Red Arrows Hawk and Jaguar.
Education
St Cross College, Oxford, 2000 — MSc Computation (Computer Science)
Engineering Council and Royal Aeronautical Society, 1999 — Chartered Aerospace Engineer
Southampton University, 1992 — BEng Aerospace Systems Engineering, Upper Second
Poltair Comprehensive School, St Austell, Cornwall, 1987 — 9 GCE ‘O’ levels
St Austell Sixth Form College, St Austell, Cornwall, 1989 — 4 GCE ‘A’ levels
Voluntary Work
In addition to my work with the Centre for Social Justice, I coached three young teachers for Teach First and I have volunteered since winter 2008/9 in the Wycombe Winter Night Shelter, working with the homeless.
Hobbies and Interests
I enjoy spending time with my wife, my extended network of friends and our godchildren plus their siblings. I currently concentrate on trail running, skydiving and motorcycling but I am also a keen advanced driver, fast catamaran sailor and photographer.