 Bob
Peirce (Chairman) served as British Consul General in Los
Angeles from June 2005 until July 2009. Prior to this appointment, he was head of
the Political and Public Affairs sections of the British Embassy in
Washington.Raised in Britain and South Africa, Bob Peirce was
educated at St. Catherine's College, Oxford University, where he
earned a BA and MA in Modern History. Subsequently he studied
Chinese at Cambridge University.
Bob joined the British Diplomatic Service in 1977 and has worked
in a number of key positions, serving in China and Hong Kong, at the
United Nations in New York and in Uganda. He was Private Secretary
to three British Foreign Secretaries (equivalent of the US Secretary
of State): Sir Geoffrey Howe, Sir John Major and Lord Douglas Hurd.
Twice a member of the Hong Kong Government (in the 1980s and
again in the 1990s), from 1993 to 1997 Bob was the Secretary
responsible for Hong Kong's external affairs under Governor Chris
Patten. For most of the period from 1979 to 1997, he was directly
involved in the negotiations with China that culminated in the
handover of Hong Kong in 1997.
Under Chris Patten's chairmanship, Bob Peirce was the Chief
Executive of the 1998 Independent Commission on Policing for
Northern Ireland. He drafted the 1999 report, which formed the basis
of policing reforms in Northern Ireland following the 1998 peace
agreement. It has been hailed by policing experts around the world
as a seminal document for policing in a democratic society as well
as a template for policing in divided societies.
In 1999, Bob became head of Political and Public Affairs at the
British Embassy in Washington, DC. While in that position, Bob
introduced a number of initiatives, including the development of
close links between police departments in the UK and the US, sharing
best practice exchanges on all aspects of policing, from forensic
DNA to public order policing to counter-terrorism.
In 2006, Bob organized the first ever visit by a British Prime
Minister to Los Angeles, which included a historic agreement on
clean energy between the UK and California governments, signed by
Prime Minister Tony Blair and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. In
2007, together with Nigel Lythgoe, Bob Peirce introduced BritWeek to
Los Angeles. |
