Dick Benschop

Dick Benschop
Dick Benschop
	Dick Benschop in 2012
Member of the House of Representatives
	In office; 23 May 2002 – 1 September 2002
Parliamentary group	Labour Party
State Secretary for Foreign Affairs
	In office; 3 August 1998 – 22 July 2002
Prime Minister	Wim Kok
Preceded by	Michiel Patijn
Succeeded by	Agnes van Ardenne ; Atzo Nicolaï
Personal details
Born	Dick Anne Benschop; Driebergen, Netherlands
Political party	Labour Party (from 1984)
Children	3 children
Residence(s)	Driebergen, Netherlands
Alma mater	Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam ; (Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts)
Occupation	Politician · historian · researcher · political consultant · businessman · corporate director · nonprofit director · academic administrator · teacher

Dick Anne Benschop (born 5 November 1957) is a former Dutch politician of the Labour Party (PvdA) and businessman. He was the CEO and chairman of the Schiphol Group since 1 May 2018 until 1 November 2022 and chairman of the Orange Foundation [nl] since 1 June 2017.

Career

Benschop worked as a political consultant for the Labour Party from 1986 until 1996. After the election of 1998 Benschop was appointed as State Secretary for Foreign Affairs in the Cabinet Kok II, serving from 3 August 1998 until 22 July 2002.

Benschop served as the Labour Party campaign manager for the election of 2002. The Labour Party suffered a big defeat in the election losing 23 seats in the House of Representatives, Leader of the Labour Party and Lijsttrekker (top candidate) Ad Melkert accepted responsibility for the defeat and sequentially left national politics. Benschop who was elected as a Member of the House of Representatives after the election, also took responsibility for the defeat and served in the House of Representatives from 23 May 2002 until his resignation on 1 September 2002.

He served as CEO of the Schiphol airport group until Sept 2022, when he resigned following months of chaos.