Delos boys
Old idea, new beneficiaries
ALMOST a decade ago, former Goldman Sachs banker and Californian hedge fund manager Rishi Sunak needed a big idea if he was going to make it in high politics.
So in November 2016, 18 months after becoming MP for Richmond, Sunak teamed up with the Centre for Policy Studies to publish Freeports Opportunity. “Around 2,500 years ago the triremes of the ancient Mediterranean – piled high with traders’ wines and olive oils – found safe harbour in the Free Port of Delos, a small Greek island in the waters of the Aegean,” he wibbled. “Offering respite from import taxes in the hope of attracting the patronage of merchants, the Delosian model of a ‘Free Port’ has rarely been out of use since.”