Baroness Valerie Amos
Speaker
Baroness Valerie Amos was appointed the Master of University College, Oxford in 2020. Prior to that she was Director of SOAS University in London. She was appointed a Labour life peer in 1997 and was the first black woman to serve in British Cabinet as Secretary of State for International Development. She went on to become Leader of the House of Lords. She has had a lifelong interest in, and commitment to, issues of equality and social justice. Her career has spanned local and national government in the UK as well as global leadership in her role as Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs at the United Nations. She also served as UK High Commissioner to Australia between 1994 and between 1994 and 1998 worked extensively in South Africa.
