David Cameron
David Cameron has made £1.6m since Brexit vote in 2016
Former prime minister’s company accounts are made public on UK’s final day in EU
by Mark SweneyDavid Cameron has made more than £1.6m since he quit as prime minister following the Brexit vote in 2016.
The accounts for the Office of David Cameron, which were made public on the UK’s final day as a member of the European Union, show that he made £836,168 in the year to 30 April 2019.
The previous year’s accounts show a profit of £790,274 with his total earnings since the company was established reaching £1.63m.
The accounts do not provide detail on how much the former prime minister has been making from speaking engagements, and book and other media deals, but they do show that an investment property valued at £128,190 was bought last April. Profit from sales of his book, For the Record, which was published in September, will appear in his next set of accounts.
The business, which names Cameron’s former political secretary Laurence Mann as the sole director, lists Cameron as the sole owner. It employed seven people last year. Cameron set up the business to manage his post-politics commercial life a month after resigning as MP for Witney in September 2016.
Last May, Cameron took a job as chairman of the advisory board of the US artificial intelligence firm Afiniti. While prime minister, Cameron was paid £143,462 a year.
After leaving office it was reported that Cameron was paid £120,000 for giving one hour-long speech to a financial company in New York. Cameron is currently listed with Washington Speakers Bureau, which also counts the former prime minister Theresa May, ex-chancellor Philip Hammond, Cherie Blair and Tony Blair’s former spin doctor Alastair Campbell as clients.
He is not the first former prime minister to do well commercialising his experiences in Downing Street. Blair, who served as prime minister from 1997 to 2007, has been reported as having amassed a £60m fortune from sources including property and consultancy fees.
Cameron has some way to go to catch up with serial job-taker George Osborne, the current editor of London’s Evening Standard newspaper. The former chancellor has at least nine jobs on the go including being paid £650,000 a year for an advisory role with the world’s largest asset management firm, BlackRock. Other roles include being an adviser to Exor, which owns Juventus and stakes in Fiat Chrysler.