His appointment in William Hague's reshuffle of Shadow Cabinet posts results from the request by his predecessor, Stephen Dorrell, to stand down from frontbench politics.

Stephen Dorrell: Looking for a change

David Willetts has been serving as a spokesman on employment, since the Tories' election defeat last year.

Mr Willetts, 42, began his career in 1978 as a Treasury civil servant, becoming head of the Monetary Policy Division.

In 1984, he joined Margaret Thatcher's Downing Street Policy Unit and from 1987 to 1992 he was Director of Studies at the Centre for Policy Studies.

He was private secretary to Nigel Lawson and Nicholas Ridley when they were in the Cabinet.

Thinker

In 1993, he became Parliamentary Private Secretary to Sir Norman Fowler, the then chairman of the Conservative Party, before entering government as Parliamentary Secretary, Public Service, and later Paymaster General.

He resigned as Paymaster General in 1996 after being accused of misleading a cross-party committee over his part in the cash-for-questions affair. He was said to have "dissembled".

But he was given a role at Conservative Central Office for the General Election in the revived post of chairman of the Conservative Research Department.

He has written numerous pamphlets on Conservative policy and thinking, and a book, Modern Conservatism, published shortly after the 1992 election.

He has a first-class degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Oxford, is married and has two children.