page_title: James Sassoon, Baron Sassoon
section_title: Government and politics
hierarchical_section_title: James Sassoon, Baron Sassoon / Career / Government and politics
caption_attribution_description: English: Lord Sassoon, Commercial Secretary to the Treasury, at 'Planning for Infrastructure and Growth How to ensure London’s place in the global economy'.
context_page_description: James Meyer Sassoon, Baron Sassoon, FCA is a British businessman and politician. After a career in the financial sector he served in various roles in HM Treasury, the UK's finance ministry, from 2002 to 2008, at which point he began advising David Cameron on financial issues. From May 2010 to January 2013, Sassoon was the first Commercial Secretary to the Treasury and was appointed to the House of Lords as a Conservative. In January 2013, he became an executive Director of Jardine Matheson Holdings and of Matheson & Co.. He is also a director of Hongkong Land and Dairy Farm and Mandarin Oriental and Chairman of the China-Britain Business Council.
  In November 2017 he was mentioned in the Paradise Papers as one of the beneficiaries of a tax exempt Cayman Island trust fund worth 236 million$ in 2007 and defended it as being of non UK origin. Sassoon was President of the international Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering 2007–2008.
context_section_description: In 2002, he joined HM Treasury, becoming managing director of Finance, Regulation and Industry, and served until 2006. Sassoon then became the Chancellor's Representative for Promotion of the City. In 2007, he was named President of the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering, also responsible for combating terrorism financing. He continued in both roles until 2008. Sassoon received a knighthood in the 2008 New Year Honours. At that time, he began advising David Cameron, then the Leader of the Opposition, and George Osborne, then the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, and became a member of the Shadow Cabinet's Economic Recovery Committee. 
  In 2009, he wrote The Tripartite Review, a review of the adequacy of the UK's three financial regulators -the Financial Services Authority, HM Treasury, and the Bank of England-), especially as regards financial stability.
  In May 2010, he was named Commercial Secretary to the Treasury, a minister whose portfolio includes financial services and business. In consequence, it was announced he would be made a life peer, and on 3 June 2010 he was introduced in the House of Lords as Baron Sassoon, of Ashley Park in the County of Surrey.
  In the 2012 Cabinet reshuffle it was announced he would be replaced by Lord Deighton in January 2013 as Commercial Secretary to the Treasury and in line with Sassoon's desire to return to the private sector.
  In November 2017, he was mentioned in the Paradise Papers as one of the beneficiaries of a tax exempt Cayman Island trust fund worth 236 million$ in 2007, and defended its assets as being of non-UK origin contributed only by his grandmother, who had died more than 40 years prior.
caption: Lord Sassoon speaking in 2012
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