Campbell Adamson

Sir (William Owen) Campbell Adamson (26 June 1922 – 21 August 2000) was a British industrialist who was best known for his work as Director-General of the Confederation of British Industry from 1969 to 1976. He rose through the steel industry where he was in charge of labour relations, and worked as a government adviser during the late 1960s.

Coming to the CBI at the peak of political controversy over the Labour government's attempt to reform trade union law, Adamson held the difficult role of representing industry through the complex struggle over Edward Heath's Industrial Relations Bill. Remarks he made about Government policy on the eve of the February 1974 election were blamed by Heath for the Conservative Party's loss of the election. Adamson was able to unite industry to support the British application to join the European Communities. In later life as Chairman of Abbey National, Adamson led the move to demutualise and convert it from a building society to a bank, and saw an overwhelming majority of the society's members support the move. Also interested in family policy, he set up the Family Policy Studies Centre.

Adamson was born in Perth, the only son of John Adamson who was a chartered accountant. His father was a strong Scottish patriot who was said to dislike "even the idea of living south of the border", but was persuaded by an attractive job offer to do so. Campbell Adamson was sent to Rugby School, and then went up to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge where he read economics under John Maynard Keynes. He married Gilvray Allan, a sociologist, in 1945.

Due to hereditary night-blindness, Adamson was rejected for military service during World War II, despite his efforts to offer his services; instead he joined the Royal Institute of International Affairs. As the war was coming to an end, Adamson took a post in industry as a management trainee for steelmaker Baldwins based in south Wales. Once trained he became general manager of the Spencer Steelworks at Llanwern; the steel industry was undergoing major changes at the time due to nationalisation and Baldwins merged with Richard Thomas in 1948 as part of the 'Steel Company of Wales'. Adamson was in charge of labour relations and his method of fair negotiation with the trade unions gave him a reputation which extended outside the steel industry.

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