From patient safety and the thrill of running a start-up, to Equal Marriage, ending HIV and whether he’ll throw his hat in the ring again for PM, Jeremy Hunts sits down with our Deputy Chairman Luke Black.
LUKE: Can you tell me why is South West Surrey, Farnham, Godalming, Haslemere and the villages the best place to live in the UK….if not the world?
JEREMY: It’s really straight forward, it has the most beautiful countryside, towns and villages you can imagine, but it is in within a stone’s throw of the most exciting city on the planet. That is what is so extraordinary about it.
And it’s basically become like that because of this British curiosity which is the 1948 Town and Country Planning Act which designated large swathes outside London as ‘Green Belt’.
What that meant was that, unlike most capital cities in other countries, development was severely restricted in order to give London a kind of ‘Green Lung’ – or at least that was the theory of it – and if you’re lucky enough to be in that ‘green lung’ as we are, then you end up with the most amazing countryside but only forty-five minutes on the train from London.
Of course, it creates pressures too, being that close to London insofar that house prices are very expensive…that’s not without its challenges but it makes it a pretty special and unique area.
LUKE: Glad to hear it. I can tell that you love it because you’ve lived there for such a long time - coming up to seventeen years – which leads me to my next question: do you remember your maiden speech, back in 2005?
JEREMY: I do actually, because it was my first big stroke of luck. I gave my maiden speech on an education debate which must have been in June of 2005 and the then Shadow Education Secretary – who was a certain David Cameron - was sitting on the front bench. He listened to it and, apparently, he thought it was a good one and offered me a job when he became leader of the party and I guess I never looked back. So yes, Luke, I do remember it incredibly well. I was incredibly nervous as I had my entire family in the gallery.
LUKE: Oh wow.
JEREMY: I even started with a joke, which was a brave thing to do. It was a big moment.
LUKE: I had no idea that DC was watching that speech and thank God he did because you went on to work in his cabinet.
JEREMY: Yes! My life would have been very different if it hadn’t been the case.
Jeremy leaving Downing Street with Penny Mordaunt MP after cabinet (Source: Business Insider)
LUKE: I’m sure there’s several examples, but if, you can, could you tell me what your proudest achievement in politics is to date?
JEREMY: Well, I’ll tell you something Luke, I probably haven’t said this before, but I did think about that for a moment recently.
I’ve done lots of amazing jobs, but I’ve made lots of mistakes too – I don’t pretend that I’ve got everything right. However, when I was Health Secretary, I was particularly concerned about some of the safety and quality issues in our hospitals.
So, I had a big focus on Patient Safety, trying to prevent accidents and avoidable harm and death in healthcare settings. This became a big theme of mine when I was Health Secretary. Actually, just a couple of weeks ago, some statistics came out to show that during the period in which I was Health Secretary the number of baby deaths went down by 412 deaths a year.
So, I was really thrilled to hear that most of the initiatives in that area where ones that I took. Alongside all the mistakes I made, there were one or two positives, and that’s probably the one that I am the proudest of.
I met so many parents who have had the most devastating heartache – losing a child. It’s unimaginable - the grief you go through when that happens.
LUKE: You’re far too modest.
JEREMY: I’m not!
LUKE: So, moving on a little bit. The videos of you at this Japanese high school went viral – everyone was so impressed with your Japanese. How is it now and how did you come to learn it?
Jeremy explaining Brexit in Japanese to Japanese students in less than 90 seconds (Source: ITV News)
JEREMY: My first job was as a management consultant like you, and I decided it wasn’t for me. I wanted to have a bit of fun in my twenties, so I decided to go to Japan and learn Japanese. There were various reasons for that…but if I am honest, my girlfriend at the time was Japanese which definitely swayed my decision.
I discovered that the way to learn a language was to get a job that forced you to speak it. So, I did all sorts of part time jobs, working in a French restaurant, a café, a wine bar and so on – I had the most fantastic time. It’s stayed with me because I think that when you learn a language when young it sticks there – you can sort of dust it down – and it’s always there.
My wife is Chinese. I did start trying to learn Chinese when I was in my forties, and I found it a thousand times harder. Then I got busy with my cabinet job, so I’ve kind of given up with it now. So, it’ll be Japanese as the one that I stick with.
LUKE: Hats off to you still – the idea of learning a whole new alphabet and reading right-to-left is impressive. Harder than French.
JEREMY: I learnt French too, but I think when the Japanese went in the French came out….
LUKE: A sort of Homer Simpson approach then?
JEREMY: Yes!
LUKE: How did your wife react to when you told her you were running to be leader of the Conservative Party and hopefully Prime Minister?
JEREMY: The great thing about Lucia is that she isn’t too wrapped up in British politics - as she moved here in 2002. So, she has a great sense of perspective and is very grounded – and doesn’t get phased by meeting all the important people you meet when in politics.
She is very good at reminding me that the most important thing in my life is my family. That is a very important thing. I know it’s a cliché to say it but in the hurly burly of politics, I thought that the real test was – are you still going to be friends when you aren’t doing some sort of important role?
The people who will always be there – whatever job you are or aren’t doing – are your family and that’s why it really matters.
Since I stepped back from the Government, it’s has just been the most wonderful thing to spend more time with my kids – who are seven, nine and eleven – and growing up really fast.
I cycle to school with one of them every morning – which is a lovely way to start the day.
LUKE: I can imagine it’s great to have someone who isn’t following every twist and turn in Westminster.
JEREMY: She does follow me on Twitter and will often grill me on what I’ve said! So knows what’s going on - but she’s just got has great priorities.
LUKE: Now, let’s talk business. One of the things I’ve always loved about you is that you’ve had a big life before politics – especially in business – where you delved into the murky waters of start-ups. Any advice for some of our more entrepreneurial members of the LGBT+ Conservatives?
JEREMY: I think starting a business is the best thing I ever did. A lot of people wait until they’ve been successful in a career, with contacts and a track record in a business. But I recommend starting one when you’re in your 20s if you can – as you’ve got nothing to lose.
When I started, I didn’t have a mortgage, I didn’t have a family and I didn’t matter too much if my business didn’t fail. In fact, my first four all failed – but I learnt a lot and had a lot of fun in the process. You can do things when you start a business in your twenties – you can make mistakes too.
But yes, you’ve got to be willing to take the risk. If you’re up for it, then I couldn’t recommend it more.
LUKE: Thanks for sharing that, Jeremy. But even earlier than all of that, you were at university at roughly the same time as David Cameron and Boris Johnson. If I told fresher Jeremy Hunt that one day he’d be sat in the same room as the two of them – with a red box – do you think he’d have believed me?
Jeremy with his wife Lucia Guo, 2019. (Source: The Times)
JEREMY: When I was at Oxford, my interest in politics really started. I was probably one of these objectionable undergraduates who think they can rule the world, become an MP and a cabinet minister, so I probably had a certain cockiness about my approach back then.
I look back at it now and realise I had absolutely no idea what a political career entail! What would I tell the then Jeremy Hunt of 1985 that I now know? I’d probably say two things.
This isn’t to put off you, Luke, or anyone else who is interested in politics, because I think it’s the most wonderful career.
LUKE: Ha, honestly don’t worry about that!
JEREMY: On the one hand there is the privilege of tackling some of the biggest problems we face as a society, like Ukraine and the pandemic, which is honestly a privilege to respond to these huge issues on behalf of your country.
First of all, politics is not a meritocracy. In business, or the civil service, or journalism and so on, you can be reasonably confident that if you’re smart and you work hard, you gradually progress. In politics, it is much more random than that.
Prime Ministers choose who is in their cabinet, not just based on talent but also who they can trust, who has been loyal to them and who they owe favours to. That’s not necessarily wrong, but it’s just how it is – in every democracy around the globe.
But if you look at Rishi Sunak, he went from being a relatively unknown backbench MP to Chancellor in less than two years. David Cameron was our Prime Minister in 2016 and, a year later, he was out after the Brexit referendum.
The result is that political careers are rollercoasters. Politics has these incredible, sudden, and dramatic changes in it. So what I’d say to the young Jeremy Hunt is make sure you are mentally prepared for those really big changes and that you’re mentally robust – as it’s not going to be stable or steady. It’s going to be wild and fun - so make sure you enjoy the ride.
Jeremy, as Culture Secretary, with the then Mayor of London Boris Johnson and the then Prime Minister David Cameron in 2012 at the Olympics. (Source: PA)
LUKE: Speaking of David Cameron, who initially inspired me to get involved in the Conservative Party, I’ll always remember seeing him on the steps of Downing Street. It felt like something new, positive and exciting was happening. How did it feel to see Mr Cameron and Samantha standing outside of Number 10?
JEREMY: David Cameron has had a rotten last year, but I do think that history will be kinder to him than the media have been in the last year.
He led the Conservative Party into government after years in opposition, which is a big achievement. He was also someone who was prepared to lead. He was prepared to tell people things that they may not have been comfortable with. I think one of the most impressive examples of that was Equal Marriage.
There are some things which can only be done by one party or another. Labour has generally had progressive views on LGBT+ issues, so it’s really when the Conservative Party embraces a position like that when you know this change is permanent, and forever, and the right change for us. So that’s why it was more significant that it was done by our party than another party.
It takes a lot of courage to do that. I was extremely proud to support him.
LUKE: I am delighted to hear that.
JEREMY: I very strongly think that the future of our party is to embrace changes in society that we all know are going to happen. I say this to be people who are sceptical about Net Zero.
‘Do you really think that in 30 years’ time we are going to be anything over than a Net Zero country?’ We will be driving electric cars and leading more ecological lives then. David Cameron had a good sense of that.
No, he didn’t get everything right – we didn’t get everything right. Looking back on that period, we were perhaps a bit too technocratic and sometimes we weren’t very good at communicating with the public. That left space for populist movements on the left and the right.
One of the lesson’s I’ve learned from that period is you need to learn how to communicate with people who aren’t that interested in politics on a day-to-day basis. Not everyone watches every development in Westminster, every day.
LUKE: Then moving on from that great day in 2010, you found yourself in DCMS as the Minister for the Olympics. You were quickly tasked with a big portfolio of work as your first ministerial role. How did you get to grips so quickly? Is there an idiot’s guide to being a minister?
JEREMY: Prime Ministers pick people for their cabinet based on ability, loyalty, experience and so on, but there’s kind of a deal whereby you have to do the job that you’re asked.
I said to David Cameron when he initially made me Shadow Culture Secretary: ‘I’m very happy to do it but you do know I know absolutely nothing about sport?’. I suddenly found myself in charge of the largest sporting event in the world and being completely clueless.
I was terrified I was going to be asked who the English Cricket Captain was on the radio – I wouldn’t have known the answer!
Jeremy with Lord Seb Coe and Lord Paul Deighton in 2012 (Source: Getty Images)
So, I thought about it and the way I dealt with it in 2010, was I decided to train to become a fully trained football referee – which I loved. That way I could get stuck into a sport and really understand it. That was my way in.
The Olympics was absolutely a privilege to be part of. I was lucky that the organisation which was running it, led by Seb Coe Lord Deighton, was exceptionally well run. I spent my time trying to anticipate things that might go wrong and make plans for every eventuality. I didn’t have to worry about the core thing because Seb Coe and Lord Deighton did such a fantastic job.
LUKE: Event management on steroids I bet. A great addition to your CV, which also went on to include Foreign Secretary and Health Secretary, which role was the most rewarding?
JEREMY: Look, every single role is rewarding in a different way – and I’ve been lucky to do a variety of different roles in Government. But the role with the most emotional punch for me was Health Secretary
I dealt with the fantastic doctors, nurses and patients in the NHS all the time. I also spent so much of my time talking to patients – which was a huge privilege.
I was attending Lady Thatcher’s funeral a few months after I became Health Secretary. In the eulogy, the Bishop of London read a letter she had written to an 11 year old boy when she was Prime Minister.
I thought to myself, I don’t think I’ve seen a single letter from the public in the first few months of this role – yet she found the time to respond to letters like this. I then found out that I had a whole team of people reading and answering these letters. So, I asked, can I please read and respond to one of these emails every day? I’d like to see when something has gone wrong.
LUKE: I bet that was hard.
JEREMY: There would be the most horrific stories. I found that was my way in to understanding the challenges facing the NHS. It was a huge privilege to be responsible for this amazing institution but – emotionally – it was very challenging.
Jeremy in a hospital in Sussex (Source: Sussex World)
LUKE: Who have you enjoyed working with the most in the Conservative Party?
JEREMY: That’s such a good question, Luke. I’ve had a lot of fun working with lots of different people. I find it hard to pick one person in particular.
I suppose the most fascinating person to deal with was President Trump, who isn’t a soul mate of mine, but I met him a lot when I was Foreign Secretary.
He was an absolute character. The thing about Trump is…it’s very tempting to underestimate him. You’d sit in a room and think, ‘He’s not very interested in me as I’m just the Foreign Secretary, I’m not the Prime Minister’, but he’d be looking at me with his beady eye, sizing me up.
I realised he was thinking like a New York property developer – trying to figure out what made me tick. That was his style of business, he was making very cunning assessments of every single person around the table. Absolutely fascinating.
LUKE: I wasn’t expecting that – I think people will find that very entertaining. So, moving on to the Conservative Government’s great record on and commitment to ending HIV – something our members are very proud of – is there anything that will get in the way of ending all new cases by 2030?
JEREMY: No, Luke, nothing at all. PreP is an amazing drug. We can really do this.
The whole story around HIV has been an extraordinary public health success story in the UK – it’s one where Britain has done extremely well. It goes in the best traditions of British public health. As a country, it was us who invented the concept of public health ever since we discovered the dangers of drinking dirty water back in the 1850s.
This [Government HIV Action Plan] is an amazing thing and really, really exciting. I would love us to be first country to completely prevent new transmission of HIV.
I happen to be very involved with an AIDS orphanage in Nairobi so I’ve seen the whole debate around AIDS, even from the time where people in Africa had to pay extortionate sums of money to access antiretroviral drugs. No one wanted to publicise the fact that ARVs, your viral load goes down so low that you end up not transmitting it to other people.
That – of course – is a miracle for children born with HIV, because it means they can have their own children. That’s a hugely significant change.
So, we should go for this full steam ahead. We started the trials with PreP when I was Health Secretary and I’m really pleased my successors have taken it forward.
Jeremy with Theresa May and Sajid Javid (Source: Huffington Post)
LUKE: Readers won’t see this, but I can see that you’re beaming you talk about this. I really hope we do it – it would be an incredible achievement for the Conservative government. As we emerge from COVID, what do the Government need to get right?
JEREMY: The key limiting factor in improving the NHS is the capacity of the system and the inelastic supply of doctors and nurses. It takes 10 years to train a GP.
You can’t just magic them off a tree or import from overseas as there’s a global shortage of doctors. You have be very long-term in your policy. That’s what’s missing in our policy at the moment – long term workforce planning. It’s just not there at the moment.
The Government has taken the hardest decision – finding an extra £12 billion a year for the next three years for the health and social care system. That’s a big commitment. But if we don’t train enough doctors and nurses in the long term, in the end we won’t be able to deliver all the operations we need to clear the backlog.
LUKE: Is that the closest thing to a silver bullet then? That recruitment gap?
JEREMY: Absolutely. It’s the most important thing that we aren’t getting right at the moment.
LUKE: I didn’t realise it took a decade for a GP to train.
JEREMY: I know, I didn’t realise this either until I became Health Secretary. That’s’ the heart of the problem – it’s never the priority for a Health Secretary or Chancellor to train enough GPs for 10 years’ time.
LUKE: There are no quick fixes, which leads me on to my next question. A lot of trans LGBT+ Conservatives are experiencing a postcode lottery in their access to healthcare. What can the Government do to improve this?
JEREMY: It is something in which the NHS can really lead the way. The best way of dealing with it is transparency, to make sure we can all access the disparities in our country. In fact, you do have a right to access any service in our country – you can ask your GP to refer you to anywhere in the UK and they have an obligation to do that.
These services are very lumpy – not just for trans people – but everyone. It was always a puzzle for me that if you take a private company like Tesco, they always manage to have almost identical service across the UK. But the NHS will have this huge variation of care even though it’s run by the state on a principle of equity. I don’t think anyone should allow their individual care to suffer as a result of it.
LUKE: I am conscious of time now, thank you so much for your time, one last question. Will I ever see people telling me ‘It has to be Hunt’ in a future Tory leadership election?
JEREMY: I would love to be Prime minister. In the leadership campaign, I found myself more enthusiastic as the campaign went on. I am also a loyalist. I know it’s not been an easy period for Boris. I do want him to get through this period – we have a huge international crisis in Ukraine to deal with. He has my full support.
Who knows what will happen in the future? I am here and my ambition has not completely dissolved.
LUKE: Delighted to hear that, I think many others will be happy to hear that too. Okay, last one, what is your favourite biscuit?
JEREMY: It has to be Jaffa Cakes. My mother, who has sadly passed away, would always give these to my children when they went to visit her.
LUKE: Thank you so much Jeremy, it really has been a privilege. I’m not saying that to be sycophantic
JEREMY: Likewise, thank you again Luke.
This interview was conducted in March 2022.
