Valerie Amos, Baroness Amos

The Right Honourable The Baroness Amos LG CH PC
Official portrait, 2013
United Nations Undersecretary General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator
In office 1 September 2010 – 29 May 2015
Secretary-General	Ban Ki-moon
Preceded by	John Holmes
Succeeded by	Stephen O'Brien
British High Commissioner to Australia
In office 1 October 2009 – 1 September 2010
Monarch	Elizabeth II
Prime Minister	Gordon Brown David Cameron
Preceded by	Helen Liddell
Succeeded by	Paul Madden
Leader of the House of Lords Lord President of the Council
In office 6 October 2003 – 27 June 2007
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	The Lord Williams of Mostyn
Succeeded by	The Baroness Ashton of Upholland
Secretary of State for International Development
In office 12 May 2003 – 6 October 2003
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Clare Short
Succeeded by	Hilary Benn
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
In office 12 June 2001 – 12 May 2003
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	The Baroness Scotland of Asthal
Succeeded by	Chris Mullin
Baroness-in-Waiting Government Whip
In office 28 July 1998 – 11 June 2001
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	The Baroness Gould of Potternewton
Succeeded by	The Lord Bassam of Brighton
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal
Incumbent
Assumed office 24 September 1997 Life peerage
Personal details
Born	Valerie Ann Amos (1954-03-13) 13 March 1954 (age 70)[1] Georgetown, British Guiana (now Guyana)
Political party	Labour
Alma mater	University of Birmingham University of Warwick University of East Anglia

Valerie Ann Amos, Baroness Amos, LG, CH, PC (born 13 March 1954) is a British Labour Party politician and diplomat who served as the eighth UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. Before her appointment to the UN, she served as British High Commissioner to Australia. She was created a life peer in 1997, serving as Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Council from 2003 to 2007.

When she was appointed Secretary of State for International Development on 12 May 2003, following the resignation of Clare Short, Amos became the first Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) woman to serve as a Cabinet minister. She left the Cabinet when Gordon Brown became Prime Minister. In July 2010, Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon announced Baroness Amos's appointment to the role of Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator.^[2] She took up the position on 1 September 2010 and remained in post until 29 May 2015. In September 2015, Amos was appointed Director of SOAS, University of London,^[3] becoming the first black woman to lead a university in the United Kingdom.^[4]

Since September 2020, Amos has been Master of University College, Oxford, succeeding Sir Ivor Crewe and becoming the first-ever black head of an Oxford college, as well as the first woman to head that college.^[5][6]