Jonathan Taylor is returning to the Treasury after a seven-year sojourn in the banking industry.

Mr Taylor, 54, a former managing director with UBS and now a banking lobbyist, will begin work as managing director of financial services at the Treasury in the new year. He will succeed Tom Scholar, who was promoted to Second Permanent Secretary in March.

After three years with UBS, which he joined as head of public policy in 2002, Mr Taylor became director-general of the London Investment Banking Association (LIBA) in 2005, promoting the interests of some of the world’s biggest investment banks. In this role he visited his old stomping ground several times, lobbying Jane Kennedy, then Financial Secretary to the Treasury, about the expense to banks of European legislation on VAT. Mr Taylor also made clear his view in the debate over bankers’ bonuses, saying last year that companies and their shareholders should determine bonuses. He said that many bonus schemes were run over several years to encourage a longer-term view, adding: “It’s not always great suitcases full of cash.”

Mr Taylor joined the chorus of disapproval over the Government’s tax on non-doms, arguing that the banking sector could suffer as senior figures who were not UK-domiciled moved abroad to avoid the £30,000 charge. More recently, he has overseen the merger of LIBA and the European operation of SIFMA (the US-based Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association) to create the Association for Financial Markets in Europe, of which he is now director-general.

As a civil servant, between 1987 and 1989 he was private secretary to Nigel Lawson, the Chancellor. He was later director of the Treasury’s macroeconomic policy and international finance directorate.

Mr Taylor was educated at Bedales School and New College, Oxford. He is married, with two children.

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