Anthony Steen

Anthony David Steen CBE (born 22 July 1939) is a former British Conservative Party politician and barrister.

Anthony David Steen was born in July 1939 to Stephen Nicholas Steen (formerly Stein ), one time Chairman and President of Smith & Nephew, and Jacqueline Annette, daughter of William (formerly Wolko or Woolf) Slavouski, a Russian fur and skin trader.

He attended Westminster School and University College London where he gained an LLB.

Steen worked at the Bernhard Baron Settlement as a youth club leader with Sir Basil Henriques, an East London magistrate, from 1959 to 1967.

He became a barrister in 1962.

As a result, Christopher Chataway MP, a junior minister for education (from 1962 to 1964), offered government funding for Task Force.

The subsequent government, under Prime Minister Harold Wilson, asked Steen to head up a national equivalent to Task Force.

He was called to the Bar in 1962 (Gray's Inn) and practised as a Barrister in landlord and tenant and common law from 1962 to 1974.

In 1963, Sir John Foster, then MP for Northwich, highlighted Steen's work in an Adjournment Debate in the House of Commons.

Whilst at the Settlement, in 1964, he founded Task Force, an organisation to enable young people to help the elderly, and served as its director from 1964 to 1968, employing 50 full-time staff.

He worked on the Court Martial's Defence Counsel for the Ministry of Defence from 1964 to 1968, lectured in law for the Council of Legal Education, 1964–67, and acted for the National Union of Headteachers from 1968 to 1972.

He championed pro-bono legal advice at the Mary Ward Advice Centre.

By 1967, Task Force had recruited 15,000 young volunteers, in their teens and twenties, from across London to help with over 7,000 vulnerable elderly and lonely people living within the 32 London boroughs.

They offered practical work such as gardening, shopping, redecorating.

Task Force worked with the majority of London boroughs and its units have, over the years, since been assimilated either within those local authorities' budgets or joined forces with existing NGOs working with the elderly.

The Young Volunteer Force Foundation (YVFF) was launched in 1968 at 10 Downing Street, with the object of recruiting young people throughout the UK to tackle community and social problems, to encourage altruism, promote people to care for those less fortunate than themselves.

YVFF employed around 100 young people.

The chairman was Selwyn Lloyd MP, a former Chancellor and Foreign Secretary, and the Vice-Chairmen were Jo Grimond MP, Leader of the Liberal Party, and Douglas Houghton MP, Chairman of the Labour Party.

Projects were launched in England, Scotland and Wales, resulting in greater community involvement and social awareness.

The Young Volunteer Force was subsequently renamed the Community Development Foundation.

Steen was its first director, serving from 1968 to 1974.

It was the largest organisation of its kind, and attracted over £1 million of government grant annually.

In 1970–71, he served as an adviser to federal and provincial Canadian governments on unemployment and youth issues.

He was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1974 to 2010, and the Chairman of the Human Trafficking Foundation.

The Task Force Trust was launched in 1974 to raise additional money for youth volunteering.

he Trust continues to exist and is presently funding projects which link asylum-seekers with local communities.

In 1978, Steen set up 'Thatcher's', a fund-raising tearoom in Liverpool, which was opened by Margaret Thatcher, then Leader of the Opposition.

Run by the local Conservative association, it raised money for local charities.

In 1981, Miles Copeland, Manager of the Police Pop Group, invited Steen to be Chairman of the Outlandos Trust, a charity funded by Police concerts.

It provided musical instruments for musically gifted but underprivileged young people.

The Trust distributed over £180,000 worth of musical instruments.

He retired from the Bar in 1983.

From 1991 to 2010, Steen was a Trustee of the Dartington International Summer School,

having been an aspiring young pianist.

From 1992 to 1994, he was Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Peter Brooke MP as Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

From 1993 to 2012, he was a trustee of Education Extra, a charity set up by Lord Young of Dartington to promote after-school activities in areas of urban deprivation.

Steen was a pupil in Heathcote Williams QC, Leonard Caplan QC Chambers, and was offered a tenancy by Sir John Foster MP QC in his Hare Court Chambers.

Having represented Totnes in Devon since 1997, he was previously MP for South Hams from 1983, and had also been the MP for Liverpool Wavertree between February 1974 and 1983.

Steen is widely acknowledged as one of the leading figures acting to combat human trafficking in the UK, and in 2015 he was appointed a CBE in recognition of his contribution to the fight against modern slavery.

In February 2016, Steen and Baron Randall of Uxbridge were appointed Special Envoys on modern slavery to the Mayor of London.