NOTICE OF DEATH - SIR CLIVE BOSSOM BT (1918 - 2017)

We regret to have to report that Sir Clive Bossom Bt passed away last Wednesday 8th March, a month after his 99th birthday. He was the oldest Member of the BRDC of which he became an Honorary Member in 1977. Initially a committee member of the Royal Automobile Club, Sir Clive’s great enthusiasm for motor sport led to him becoming the first chairman of the RAC Motor Sports Council when it superseded the RAC Competitions Committee as the governing body of British motor sport in 1975. In the same year Sir Clive, at the instigation of its President, Earl Mountbatten of Burma, became chairman of the RAC. It was a turbulent time both for the RAC and, for different reasons, in the world of Formula 1 where Max Mosley and Bernie Ecclestone were locking horns with Jean-Marie Balestre.

In Sir Clive, Max and Bernie found a strong ally who used his position as a Vice-President of the FIA to gain access to the financial structure of the FIA, the CSI and its successor the FISA, and later to take Balestre to task. Always keen to protect British interests, he is recorded as having said of the experience ‘We fought like tigers against the French’.

Prior to his involvement with the RAC, Sir Clive had served with the Royal East Kent Regiment during World War Two, rising to the rank of Major. From 1959 to 1974 he was Member of Parliament for Leominster and held a number of junior ministerial positions during the Macmillan, Douglas-Home and Heath governments. From 1975 to 1982 Sir Clive was chairman of the British Roads Federation and was outspoken against such matters as fuel-saving speed limits and a levy on vehicles entering city centres. He was active in international relations being President of the Anglo-Netherlands Society, the Anglo-Belgian Society and the Iran Society. He was International President of the International Social Service for Refugees, Chairman of the Ex-Servicemen’s War Disabled Help Committee and Vice-Chairman of the Red Cross and Order of St John.

To his wife Lady Barbara, their four children Bruce, Andrew, Jamie and Arabella and their seven grandchildren the BRDC offers its most sincere condolences. We understand that there is to be a private family funeral but that details of a service of Thanksgiving in London will be announced in due course.