Martin Couchman is Deputy Chief Executive of the British Hospitality Association, responsible for co-ordinating the BHA?s lobbying activities in Whitehall, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Brussels. He chairs the Social Affairs Committee of HOTREC, the hotel and restaurant industry?s European association, and is a former chairman of the CBI?s Sectoral Employment Issues Committee.
Prior to joining the BHA in 1993, he was at the National Economic Development Office, where he was Secretary to the National Economic Development Council under two Chancellors of the Exchequer, and, before that, UK Director of European Year of the Environment. ?Earlier, he spent seven years in the building industry after reading law at Oxford University.
He was appointed an OBE in the New Year Honours 2005 and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.