Patrick Carter, Baron Carter of Coles

Patrick Robert Carter, Baron Carter of Coles (born 9 February 1946) is a Labour life peer in the House of Lords.

Early life and career Carter was educated at Brentwood School, Essex, where he was a contemporary of Jack Straw. In his autobiography, Straw described Carter as his closest friend.

Carter then studied economics at Durham University and joined an investment bank as a trainee after he graduated.

In 1985, Carter founded Westminster Health Care, which provided radiology services as well as care to the elderly and those with special needs. He sold the healthcare provider in 1999.

Carter has served on the boards of several US and UK healthcare, insurance and information technology companies. He was president of McKesson Corporation's International Operations Group and was responsible for the company's product portfolio.

He is currently the chair of Primary Insurance Group and Health Services Laboratories.

Carter was Chair of Sport England from 2002 to 2006; a board member of the London 2012 Olympic bid; a member of HM Treasury's Productivity Panel; and a non-executive member of the Home Office and Prisons Boards.

In 2021, Carter was the only Labour member of the House of Lords to vote against an amendment to the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022 that would have reduced existing long lease ground rents to a peppercorn, or zero financial value. In 2025, The Telegraph reported that Carter was a freeholder, through The Freehold Corporation of which he was a director, of a 122-flat development in Ilford, east London with ground rent charges that increased every five years by the retail price index, negatively affecting the mortgageability and saleability of leaseholders' homes.

Personal life Carter is an active farmer in Hertfordshire and has a villa in France.

Honours Carter was made a life peer as Baron Carter of Coles, of Westmill in the County of Hertfordshire on the advice of Prime Minister Tony Blair on 8 June 2004. He takes the Labour whip.