EURIM Key Officers - Biographical Notes

EURIM Chair: Margaret Moran MP

EURIM Vice Chair: Ian Taylor MBE MP

EURIM President: The Lord Renwick

EURIM Secretary General:  Philip Virgo

EURIM Deputy Secretary General: Dr David Wright

EURIM Chair: Margaret Moran MP
Margaret Moran is the Labour MP for Luton South.

Margaret Moran was first elected as the MP for Luton South in May 1997, and re-elected in June 2001. She worked her way up through local government and won a well-deserved reputation for hard work and toughness.

Her interests span a wide range of concerns from Northern Ireland, to Housing, Domestic Violence, new technologies, and social exclusion and football.

Margaret was born on the 24th April 1955 in East London to Irish parents. She was educated at St Ursula's High School, Greenwich, St Mary's College, Twickenham and Birmingham University, where she gained honours Degree in Geography and Sociology.

She was a Labour councillor for 13 years and was the first woman leader of Lewisham Borough Council. She pioneered the use of new technologies in service delivery and local democracy and helped with the relocation of Millwall Football Club. In 1997 she served as PPS to Transport Minister, Rt Hon Gavin Strang and later became PPS to Dr Mo Mowlam.

Until the disolution or Parliament, she was chair of the all party parliamentary group on Domestic Violence and the Parliamentary Labour Housing Group and the Parliamentary Labour Party Parliamentary Affairs Committee and was Secretary of the Parliamentary Labour Party Northern Ireland Committee. Margaret also founded Labour's E-futures group and in May 2000 was awarded the Government Computing Information Age Innovator of the Year.

She was member of the Northern Ireland Select Committee and later a member of the Public Administration Select Committee. She is also a member of the All Party Small Business Group; Information Technology group, Kashmir Group and Children's Group. She is also a member of the Hansard Society Commission on the Scrutiny of Parliament.

In Parliament, she was responsible for the ground breaking Womenspeak project using interactive ICT to link Parliamentarians and survivors of Domestic Violence. As a result, she has driven policy and legislative changes to provide greater fairness for Domestic Violence survivors in immigration cases, greater protection for Domestic Violence survivors in court and ensure they get priority for rehousing.

In local government she has served as Deputy Chair of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities and Chair of its Housing Committee. In Lewisham she introduced the leading edge "Democracy Project", using new technologies and led Lewisham's successful city challenge urban regeneration schemes.

Margaret lives in Luton and is a Governor of Denbigh Infant School and Cardinal Newman High School. She is a member of Voluntary Action Luton, a Director (non-remunerated) of NOAH, formerly Luton Day Centre for the homeless and on the Court of the University of Luton. She is President of Luton Irish Forum

Her private interests include ceilidhs, visiting historical sites, walking and eating curry.

EURIM Vice Chair: Ian Taylor MBE MP
Ian Taylor is the Conservative MP for Esher and Walton.

Ian Taylor was born in 1945. He was educated at Whitley Abbey School in Coventry, Keele University (BA Hons. in Economics, Politics & Modern History) and the London School of Economics (Research Scholar). Ian is married to Carole and they have two sons, Arthur and Ralph.

In 1969 Ian joined Hill Samuel & Co (Merchant Bankers) moving on to Stirling & Co (stockbrokers) in 1971 where he created and managed the European Department.  From 1975-78 he was a corporate finance advisor in Paris. On his return to London, he merged his business with Mathercourt Securities Limited (FIMBRA), providing corporate finance and management advice to developing companies in the UK and USA.   After 1987, until becoming a Minister in 1994, Ian was an advisor to Commercial Union plc., and Barclays de Zoete Wedd Investment Management. He is an Associate of the UK Society of Investment Professionals and a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists.

Since the 1997 General Election, Ian has been involved in providing development capital and management assistance to UK technology companies.  He is Executive Director of Interregnum plc. (www.interregnum.com) a merchant bank serving technology companies.  His portfolio of business interests includes directorships of Next Fifteen Group plc. (www.nextfifteen.com), Petards Group plc. (www.screenplc.com) (Deputy Chairman), Radioscape Limited (www.radioscape.com) (Chairman) and Speed-Trap Limited (www.speed-trap.com).

Pamphlets written by Ian include,  'Fair Shares for all the Workers' (Adam Smith Inst, November 1988); 'A Community of Employee Shareholders', (Bow Group, March 1992); 'Releasing the Community Spirit' (Tory Reform Group, September 1990); 'The Positive Europe' (Conservative Group for Europe, May 1993);  'Escaping the Protectionist Trap' (Social Market Foundation/DTI,February 1995);   'Networking' (CPC, May 1996); &  'The Conservative Tradition in Europe'  - contributor - (Mainstream, October 1998), 'Restoring the Balance' (Tory Reform Group, October 2000). 'Full Steam Ahead: The Great National debate about Britain and Europe' (Britain in Europe, July 2001), 'Europe: Our Case' (Tory Europe Network, 2002) and 'Shaping the new Europe - The British Opportunity.' (EUW: Alison Tennant Lecture, 2002), 'Twin Towers: Europe and America' (Tory Europe Network, 2003), Corporate Social Responsibility - Should Business be Socially Aware? (Tory Reform Group, 2003).

Ian's hobbies and interests include the opera, shooting and cigars.

Political Biography

Ian was Member of Parliament for Esher 1987-1997; and for Esher and Walton from May 1997. He was Minister for Science and Technology at the Department of Trade and Industry (1994-97).

Previous Parliamentary appointments have included: Parliamentary Private Secretary to The Rt. Hon. William Waldegrave MP at the Foreign Office (1988-1990), the Department of Health (1990-1992) and as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (1992-1994), former member of the Finance Bill Committees (1987-1994), member of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee (1987-1990), member of the Science and Technology Select Committee (1998-2001) and Shadow Front Bench Spokesman on Northern Ireland (1997).

In the House of Commons, he is a Board Member of the Parliamentary Office of Science & Technology, Director of EURIM (European Information Society Group), Vice Chairman of PITCOM (Parliamentary Information and Technology Committee), an officer of the Parliamentary Space Committee and an adviser to the Broadband Stakeholders Group.He was also Hon Secretary of the Parliamentary Group for Engineering Development 1997-2001.

Other appointments have included, National Chairman of the Federation of Conservative Students (1968-1969), Chairman of the European Union of Christian Democrat and Conservative Students (1969-1970), Chairman Conservative Group for Europe (1984-1987), and Vice-President (1998-), Chairman of the Conservative Foreign & Commonwealth Committee (1988-1993), and Patron of the Tory Reform Group (1999-).  Chairman of the European Movement (2001 - 2004). www.euromove.org.uk.

Ian is currently Chairman Tory Europe Network (www.toryeuropenetwork.org.uk), on the Council of Britain in Europe (www.britainineurope.org.uk) and the German-British Forum.

EURIM President: The Lord Renwick
Lord Renwick was a member of the House of Lords from 1973 until November 1999. His special interests include the processes of innovation and change, informatics and telematics, the application of technology, and space and special educational needs.

When a parliamentary peer he was at times a member of the Select Committee on Science and Technology, the Select Committee on the European Communities and Sub Committee B (Energy, Transport and Technology). He was the Honorary Secretary of PITCOM (the Parliamentary IT Committee) and of the Parliamentary Space Committee and a member of the Parliamentary Scientific Committee and the All-Party Disablement Group among others. He was also a Council member of the National Council for Educational Technology, now BECTA.

Born in 1935, he was educated at Eton and spent his National Service with the Grenadier Guards. He then went on to start a career in the city with Morgan Grenfell in 1957 and then moved to W Greenwell & Co in 1959 where he stayed until 1980, becoming a partner in 1964. He was a Director of General Technology Systems Ltd from 1975 - 1993. He has acted as an advisor to various companies in the UK and the USA.

He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, the Royal Geographical Society, and the Zoological Society of London. He is a member of the Foundation for Science and Technology. He was also Vice President of the Combustion Engineering Association, Chairman of the Dyslexia Educational Trust and Chairman (now a Vice President) of the British Dyslexia Association.

EURIM Secretary General: Philip Virgo
Philip has been associated with EURIM since it was relaunched in January 1994 . He was the first executive officer to be appointed and has carried the designation Secretary General since 1996.

He was an LCC scholar at Dulwich College, an exhibitioner at Peterhouse, Cambridge (where he read history) and was subsequently the first graduate trainee programmer for STC's Microwave and Line Division in Basildon. He then moved to ICL where he re-wrote and decimalised the Group Sales Ledgers before they sponsored him on the MSc programme at the London Business School. On return to ICL he ran the tri-partite (ICL-DTI-DoE) planning exercise to produce Computing Development plans for the about-to-be-formed Regional Water Authorities. After a year as Business Planning and Modelling Consultant in the Management Sciences Unit of ICL he then served as Comptroller and Business Development Manager for Public Corporation Sector.

In 1977 he changed career and moved to the Wellcome Foundation as Corporate Planner responsible for R&D, Export Division and the European Subsidiaries (including exercises on the potential of emerging technologies for improving health care, including of aging populations). At Wellcome he became involved in national IT Policy issues, helped draft the technology policies of both main parties for the 1979 election and in 1981 was the founding "Industry Vice-Chairman" of the Parliamentary Information Technology Committee (PITCOM).

In 1982 he returned full-time to ICT and joined the National Computing Centre (NCC) to handle National Issues and set up a Technology Assessment Service. Shortly afterwards he was given responsibility for the NCC Microsystem Centre: the flagship "awareness programme" of the day. From 1983-1989 he ran the City C3 Club, bringing together high tech investors and fund-seekers. He helped found the Federation Against Software Theft (FAST) in 1984, ran the NCC studies into reasons for the IT Skills Crisis of the mid-1980s and actions likely to be effective and also provided inputs to ministers on how best to advise small firms and encourage investment in innovation. After leaving NCC in 1986 he was retained as an advisor until 1992 and was on the South East regional committee as a member for several years afterwards.

Philip was Finance Executive of PITCOM from 1982-2006 and remains on the Council and Programme Committee. He was an external advisor to the High Tech Unit of Barclays Bank (1983-89), Campaign Director for the Women in IT Campaign (1989-92), IT Skills Advisor to the West London TEC (1991-2, a Specialist Advisor to the Information Committee of the House of Commons (1993-4), has been Strategic Advisor to the Institute for the Management Information Systems (IMIS, previously IDPM) since 1993 and has served on various advisory boards and committees. He has written extensively on the social and economic impact of new technologies and how to handle them, whether from a political or business perspective.  

He is married with one son.

EURIM Deputy Secretary General – Dr David Wright
Dr. David Wright is Deputy Secretary General of EURIM.  He is also Research Assistant to Dr Nick Palmer, Labour MP for Broxtowe as well as continuing his academic career as a geologist - currently conducting microbiogeochemical and sedimentological research in several areas that are contributing to our understanding of carbon sequestration in relation to climate change. 

He is a Fellow of the Geological Society, Honorary Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Leicester and works with professional colleagues from many parts of the world.  He is the author of many research papers, a frequent contributor to learned conferences and has travelled extensively, with particular interests in Australia, South Africa and the USA .  He is also an independent geological consultant to the hydrocarbon industry, having undertaken projects for many major corporations including Anadarko, ARCO, BPAmoco, Chevron, Conoco, Corelab, Enterprise, Exxon Mobil, NAM, PDO, Shell, Statoil and Texaco. 

Dave was an undergraduate at Nottingham University where he obtained B.Sc (Hons) in Geology and was then a postgraduate student at the Earth Sciences Department of Oxford University, being awarded his D.Phil in 1993.  Prior to entering university as a mature student, he worked in industry and the UK Civil Service, during which time he gained a qualification in supervisory studies, and was active in both the Transport and General Workers Union and the Civil and Public Services Association (now the PCS). 

With his knowledge of parliamentary, scientific and industrial activities, Dave is able to bring a wide range of experiences and methodologies to his EURIM work on ICT policy.

Dave is married and lives near Nottingham.  In his (limited) spare time, Dave is a keen rambler, football supporter (Burnley FC) and wine enthusiast.