Sir Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (born 1 November 1966) is a British politician who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2022 to 2024 and Foreign Secretary from 2018 to 2019, having previously served as Secretary of State for Health and Social Care from 2012 to 2018 and as Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport from 2010 to 2012. A member of the Conservative Party, he has been the Member of Parliament for Godalming and Ash, formerly South West Surrey, since 2005. Hunt also served as Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Shadow Cabinet of Rishi Sunak from July to November 2024.

The son of an Admiral of the Royal Navy, Hunt was born in Kennington and studied philosophy, politics and economics at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was President of the Oxford University Conservative Association. He was first elected to the House of Commons in 2005 and was promoted to the Shadow Cabinet as Shadow Minister for Disabled People and later as Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Hunt served in the coalition government as Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, in which post he led the drive for local TV, resulting in Ofcom awarding local TV broadcasting licences in respect of several cities and towns. Hunt also oversaw the 2012 London Olympics, which received widespread acclaim. His previous business interests mean that he is one of the UK's richest politicians.

Hunt served as Secretary of State for Health, later Health and Social Care, under the premierships both of David Cameron and of Theresa May, and became the longest-serving health secretary in British political history. During his tenure, Hunt oversaw the imposition of a controversial new junior doctors' contract in England after a dispute in which junior doctors undertook multiple strikes, the first such industrial action for 40 years. Following the resignation of Boris Johnson as foreign secretary over the Chequers Agreement, Hunt was appointed Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs in July 2018. He was a candidate for the leadership election in 2019, finishing second to Johnson. He served as Chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee from 2020 to 2022, a prominent role due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Following Johnson's resignation amid a government crisis in July 2022, Hunt launched a second leadership bid, but was eliminated in the first ballot of Conservative MPs.

Hunt was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer by Liz Truss on 14 October 2022, following the dismissal of Kwasi Kwarteng, and retained the post in Rishi Sunak's ministry following Truss's resignation amid a government crisis. During his time in the position, Hunt presented two budgets in 2023 and 2024 and two autumn statements in 2022 and 2023. After the Conservatives lost the 2024 general election in a landslide to the opposition Labour Party led by Keir Starmer, Hunt was succeeded as chancellor by Rachel Reeves and served as Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer in Sunak's caretaker Shadow Cabinet. The left-wing New Statesman magazine named him as the third most powerful right-wing figure of 2023, behind only Nigel Farage and Rishi Sunak.

Jeremy Hunt was born on 1 November 1966 in Lambeth Hospital, Kennington, and raised in Shere, Surrey. He is the eldest son of Admiral Sir Nicholas Hunt, who was then a Commander in the Royal Navy assigned to work for the Director of Naval Plans inside the recently created Ministry of Defence, and his wife Meriel Eve Hunt, Lady Hunt (née Givan; 1937–2022), daughter of Major Henry Cooke Givan. The Hunt family were landed gentry, of Boreatton, Baschurch, Shropshire. A cousin was Agnes Hunt, pioneer of orthopaedic nursing.

Through a paternal great-grandmother, Hunt is a descendant of Sir Streynsham Master, a pioneer of the East India Company. He is also a distant relative of Queen Elizabeth II and of British Union of Fascists leader Sir Oswald Mosley. His father worked in NHS management after retiring from the navy, and his mother was a nurse in the 1950s and 1960s.

Hunt was privately educated at Charterhouse where he was Head of School. He then studied philosophy, politics and economics at Magdalen College, Oxford, graduating with a first class honours Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree. He became involved in Conservative politics while at university, where David Cameron and Boris Johnson were contemporaries. He was active in the Oxford University Conservative Association (OUCA) and was elected to serve as president in 1987.

Following university, Hunt worked as a management consultant at OC&C Strategy Consultants for two years and then became an English language teacher in Japan. On his return to Britain, he tried his hand at a number of different entrepreneurial business ventures, with three failed start-ups including an attempt to export marmalade to Japan. In 1991, Hunt co-founded a public relations agency named Profile PR specialising in IT with Mike Elms, a childhood friend. Hunt and Elms later sold their interest in Profile PR to concentrate on directory publishing.