Geoffrey Martin

Thomas Geoffrey Martin OBE (born 26 July 1940) is a politician from Northern Ireland and the longest-serving head of the Representation of the European Commission in the United Kingdom. He led the offices in London, Belfast, Cardiff and Edinburgh during the years from the completion of the Single Market until after the Maastricht Treaty was ratified (1993–2003). He was appointed an the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2002 New Year Honours.

Early life and education Martin was born in the Irish border town of Newry and lived in and around the townland of Mullaghglass and the linen village of Bessbrook in South Armagh until his late teens. He attended Bessbrook Public Elementary School, Newry Grammar School and Queens University Belfast where he played for the hockey First XI. He graduated with an honours degree in Geography in 1964. In 1964 he was elected Vice President for International Affairs of the National Union of Students. In that year the NUS was voted out of the International Student Conference by left wing and Communist Party influences within its membership.

In 1966 he was elected President of the NUS. It voted to rejoin the International Student Conference. In 1967 he was elected chairman of the Supervision Committee of the International Student Conference.

Early career Martin joined merchant bank Hill Samuel in 1969, and after two years, the ship broking and insurance company Seascope.

He stood as the Labour Party candidate for Ludlow at the February 1974 general election, but was unsuccessful, finishing third of three candidates with 23.53% of the vote.

In the autumn of 1974 he joined the diplomatic staff of the Commonwealth Secretariat. and was appointed in 1979

The Northern Ireland office opened early in 1980. Martin developed relationships across the full spectrum of party politics including with the paramilitary organisations and with the direct rule administration in Belfast and the Government of Ireland in Dublin. He met a Provisional Sinn Féin delegation in his office, led by its president Gerry Adams.

On the tenth anniversary of the accession to the European Community, he hosted a televised dinner in Belfast. The major speakers were the Rt Hon Edward Heath and the Irish Taoiseach Garret Fitzgerald, the second Irish Prime Minister ever to have spoken in public in Northern Ireland.

He organised a tour of 10 cities in the USA with a delegation of Northern Ireland politicians, journalists and business people including John Hume and Ian Paisley.

Delegation of the European Commission to the Association of South East Asian Nations After five years, early in 1985, Martin was posted to South East Asia, based in Bangkok, to the Delegation of the European Commission to the Association of South East Asian Nations, as the head of the Press and Information Service.

He was appointed head of the EU Representation to the UK in 1993; his term of office came to an end in 2002

Commonwealth Secretariat He was seconded by the commission to the Office of the Commonwealth Secretary General in 2003.

Martin retired from the commission in 2005 but remained in the Office of the Commonwealth Secretary General until 2015.

Personal life Martin married Gay Brownrigg, a barrister, in July 1968 in the Temple Church, London. They have four children.