IT WAS the events of September 11, 2001 that pushed a somewhat reluctant Sax Riley into the centre of the international insurance arena. Although renowned within the London insurance market as a plain-speaking Lancastrian, the then Chairman of Lloyd’s of London had kept a much lower profile than his predecessors, instead seeing his role as driving the reform of the 300-year-old institution.
The destruction of the World Trade Centre pushed Riley into the limelight, as Lloyd’s ultimately faced more than £5 billion in gross claims. Riley insisted on being seen to lead Lloyd’s presence in the US, and New York in particular, in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, and within days he visited Ground Zero.
The group of three who went to the site of the twin towers included a young state trooper who was clearly traumatised by the destruction he was witnessing. Riley — not renowned for his empathy within the business environment — comforted the trooper, and over the next few days spoke to many businesses within the insurance sector which had lost many of their people in the collapse of the towers. Riley’s compassion during that period won him many supporters in the weeks and months following the disaster, as he blossomed into an international leadership role for the global insurance industry.
Riley’s rise to become the figurehead of the insurance industry after 9/11 belied his humble roots, of which he always remained proud. Born in West Didsbury in 1939, Saxon Riley attended Chorlton Grammar School and was a noted sportsman, particularly on the football field. He eschewed a professional footballer’s life for the insurance industry, however, and after National Service he joined Cornhill in Manchester before moving to the family broking firm of Schofields, which nurtured his talent.
The Manchester office of Price Forbes was his next career move, and he moved with them across to the broking company’s South African operations. It was here that his career started to flourish, specialising in construction insurance business. His direct approach proved very successful for winning business in South Africa, and brought him to the attention of the London management. On his return to the UK in 1970, he spearheaded the construction insurance programme for the Channel Tunnel project, earning himself a reputation for innovation, and led the team dealing with blue chip clients such as British Petroleum, ICI, Unilever and Shell.
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His flexible mind and ability to identify business opportunities led to his being one of the creators of the “package” business for multinationals in the 1970s and 1980s. As well as his strong business acumen, Riley’s quick-wittedness and dry sense of humour meant that he was universally viewed as good company, as well as a “work hard, play hard” man, although he refused to surrender his Lancastrian edge.
At that time Lloyd’s was typified by the old school tie, and it could be this that helped him to stand out from the rest of the crowd. Riley’s insistence on doing things his own way also marked him out from many of his peers, though his powers of persuasion were prodigious. Although not highly educated — he had left school at 16 — he was self-taught, and had a natural instinct for the insurance business which meant that he was seldom wrong when arguing the toss.
In 1979 the by now Sedgwick Forbes merged with Bland Payne, and Riley was appointed joint managing director of the international operations, though he was unsure at that point that he would stay in the business. However, by the mid-1980s he had reached the main board, and finally had a chance to influence the direction of the business. Stories abound of his ability to turn the whole board round from a position of opposition to his way of thinking.
The early 1990s saw Lloyd’s of London unravelling, and Riley’s predecessor at Sedgwick, Sir David Rowland, stepped across to lead the Lloyd’s rescue package. Riley became chief executive, and then chairman on Lord Fanshaw’s retirement.
Sedgwick’s position in the international insurance broking arena was fast being eroded by the massive growth of its two largest competitors, Marsh McLennan and Aon, and Riley identified correctly that consolidation was inevitable. With that in mind, he first viewed the British broker Willis as a potential merger partner, but ultimately allowed Sedgwick to be bought by Marsh in 1998, a deal which was viewed as particularly beneficial to Sedgwick shareholders. Riley then joined Marsh’s board in the US, retiring two years later to take on the role of Chairman of Lloyd’s.
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Riley had been approached several times by Lloyd’s before he finally assented to take over the position from Sir David Rowland, and was a somewhat reluctant chairman in the early days. Initially, he saw his task as a year-long project to restructure Lloyd’s antiquated capital base, through the newly-formed Chairman’s Strategy Group. But it soon became apparent that the problems at Lloyd’s were greater than just the problems of the capital base, and that his tenure was likely to be stretched beyond the one year he had expected. His three-day week, however, remained sacrosanct, indicating the intensely separate private life he conducted away from the London business community.
Nine months into the first year of his two-year stint as Chairman of Lloyd’s, the international insurance community sustained the greatest loss event in its history, and predictions of cataclysmic results for the industry. Rather than offer hastily gathered — and inevitably wildly inaccurate — loss estimates for the World Trade Center, Riley insisted that Lloyd’s hold back for a few days and gather some credible information, while letting the executive at Lloyd’s manage the crisis. His involvement with Marsh, a US company which lost several hundred staff, meant that he was profoundly affected personally by the loss, but he realised the need for Lloyd’s to have a public face, and he stepped up to fill that role admirably. After previously shying away from media exposure, he appeared on several business programmes in the US, always reiterating at the outset the deep tragedy felt by all and his personal sorrow. At that point, Riley’s unerring honesty and integrity shone through.
Once the dust had settled, Riley continued with the market reform his Chairman’s Strategy Group had identified. He moved Lloyd’s from its three-year accounting system to an annual model, and stopped the addition of any more unlimited liability names.
He retired from Lloyd’s at the end of last year, though he maintained a connection with the market through his involvement with SOC plc, a Lloyd’s agency. This was indicative of the loyalty he always maintained for the London insurance market, which he insisted was the premier insurance business arena in the world.
His intensely private nature meant that he kept his family and business lives very separate. He was an avid — and extremely fast — reader, with a passion in particular for the Bloomsbury set, and a photographic memory. Sport continued to play a major role in his life, and he was a member of MCC and an active golfer. He died on the fourth fairway playing in the annual Lloyd’s of London versus the Insurance Golfing Society of London match.
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His first wife, Janice, died in 1996. He remarried in 2002, and is survived by his second wife Wendy, and by two sons and a daughter from his first marriage.
Sax Riley, Chairman of Lloyd’s of London, 2001-02, was born on February 11, 1939. He died on July 25, 2003, aged 64.