Eddy Shah

Eddy Shah was born in Cambridge.[2] His mother was English and his father was Iranian. Shah was educated at the Scottish co-educational independent boarding school of Gordonstoun, and at both Haywards Heath Grammar School and Haywards Heath Secondary Modern School, at Haywards Heath in Sussex. He then attended a Brighton cram school, where he obtained seven GCE 'O' Levels.

Shah held various jobs, amongst which was floor manager for Granada's television studio.

After he was fired from the Manchester Evening News in 1976, he decided to launch into newspaper publishing on his own and started with the proceeds of £14,000 from the sale of his first home, in Sale, which he had bought for £4,000.

As the owner of six local newspapers, Shah employed anti-trade union laws introduced by the Margaret Thatcher governments to defeat the print unions after national strikes that went on for seven months, despite receiving death threats. He was the first person to invoke Thatcher's trade union laws de-recognise unions. The Wapping dispute followed three years later.

Shah first confronted the trade unions at his Warrington print works and the Manchester news offices in 1983. As the owner of the Warrington Messenger, he sacked six workers in a declared anti-union move. In response, the National Graphical Association (NGA) began mass picketing of the Messenger's offices.

On 30 November, 1983, over four thousand trade unionists attended a mass picket. The police brought in riot-trained Police Support Units from five surrounding areas and the confrontation became physical. The NGA speaker van was attacked and overturned by police, while squads with full riot gear repeatedly charged the pickets. The National Graphical Association immediately suspended mass picketing. For the first time in post-war Britain, para-military policing more akin to that used in Northern Ireland had been used to attack strikers in an industrial dispute.[3]

In 1986 he launched Today, selling it in 1987 to Tiny Rowland's conglomerate Lonrho. He then launched The Post,[4] which ran five weeks before shutting down. Shah sold his newspapers in 1988 and set up an independent TV company.[1][2]

Shah is the author of several novels, including The Lucy Ghosts (Doubleday, 1991), Ring of Red Roses (Corgi, Doubleday, 1992), Manchester Blue (Corgi, 1993), and Fallen Angels (Doubleday, 1994). After a break from writing, he returned in 2008 with a thriller entitled Second World (Pan Books).

Shah now owns and runs golf courses, leisure centres and hotels, including the Wiltshire Golf and Country Club, Royal Wootton Bassett.[2] He has recently built 44 holiday homes at his Wiltshire Golf club.