Sir Derek Ezra, former chairman at the National Coal Board, has been given a life peerage in the New Year honors list. He will support the Liberal Party in the House of Lords.
The son of a Sephardi Jew from Bombay, Ezra was born in Tasmania 61 years ago. Brought to Britain as a boy, he was educated at Cambridge University where he was a friend and contemporary of Abba Eban, the former Israeli Foreign Minister.
During World War II he served in the Intelligence Corps, reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. On demobilization, he joined Britain’s newly nationalized coal industry and headed the coal board’s marketing department before becoming its chairman II years ago.
Though not an observant Jew, Ezra is a warm friend of Israel, frequently attending Jewish fund raising functions. In the last two years of his chairmanship, the Board became a major supplier of coal to the Israeli electricity industry.
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