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Paul Madden

British Ambassador to Japan

Part of UK in Australia

1st April 2014

New Australian High Commissioner in London

HE Paul Madden and Hon Alexander Downer

The new Australian High Commissioner in London will be moving back into his teenage home when he takes up his position in May. Alexander Downer, whose appointment was announced yesterday, lived at the splendid official residence, Stoke Lodge near Hyde Park, when his father was High Commissioner in London from 1964-72. He went to school and university in the UK, so he knows us very well indeed.

HE Paul Madden and Hon Alexander Downer
HE Paul Madden and Hon Alexander Downer

Alexander certainly has a very strong background for the job. He was Australia’s longest-serving Foreign Minister, holding the post for over eleven years from 1996-2007. Much earlier in his career he was an Australian diplomat before going into politics. Most recently he has been the UN Secretary General’s Special Adviser on Cyprus.

I’ve got to know Alexander, and his British wife Nicky, well on my regular visits to Adelaide over the past three years, so I’m very much looking forward to working closely with him. We’ll have a busy agenda together, across all the foreign and defence policy collaboration we recently discussed at AUKMIN, as well as G20, commercial ties and all the many people to people exchanges.

Alexander’s appointment means we’re saying farewell to Mike Rann somewhat earlier than expected. Mike has been doing a great job in London and we’ll miss him. But he’s taking up an important new appointment as Ambassador in Rome and we wish him and Sasha well there.

About Paul Madden

Paul Madden has been the British Ambassador to Japan from January 2017. He was Additional Director for Asia Pacific at the FCO in 2015.He was British High Commissioner to Australia…

Paul Madden has been the British Ambassador to Japan from January 2017.

He was Additional Director for Asia Pacific at the FCO in 2015.He was British High Commissioner to Australia until February 2015. Prior to this he was British High Commissioner in Singapore from 2007-2011.

A career diplomat, he was previously Managing Director at UK Trade and Investment (2004-2006), responsible for co-ordinating and
implementing international trade development strategies to support
companies across a wide range of business sectors.

As Assistant Director of Information at the Foreign and Commonwealth
Office (2003-2004) he was responsible for public diplomacy policy,
including managing the FCO funding of the BBC World Service, the British
Council and the Chevening Scholarships programme. He led the team
responsible for the award-winning UK pavilion at the Aichi Expo in Japan
2005.

He was Deputy High Commissioner in Singapore from 2000-2003 and has
also served in Washington (1996-2000) and Tokyo (1988-92). Between
1992-96 he worked on EU enlargement and Environmental issues at the FCO
in London.

Before joining FCO he worked at the Department of Trade and Industry
(1980-87) on a range of industrial sectors and trade policy, including
two years as a minister’s Private Secretary.

He has an MA in Economic Geography from Cambridge University, an MBA
from Durham University, studied Japanese at London University’s School
of Oriental and African Studies, and is a Fellow of the Royal
Geographical Society. His first book, Raffles: Lessons in Business
Leadership, was published in 2003.

Married to Sarah, with three children, he was born in 1959, in Devon.