My brother, David de Peyer, who has died aged 87 of pneumonia, exacerbated by post-polio syndrome, was a dedicated public servant and director general of the Cancer Research Campaign. Using a wheelchair after contracting polio aged 20, he led a life of conspicuous achievement in the face of disability.
Born in London, David was the son of Charles de Peyer, a civil servant, and Flora (nee Collins), a classical singer. Educated at Rendcomb college, Gloucestershire, he excelled at cross-country running and hockey. During national service in the 1950s he was seconded to the Royal West African Frontier Force, Nigeria, where he served in Kaduna. He was proud to have been chosen to represent Nigeria in a hockey match against Ghana.
During this posting David contracted polio. Although it was a cruel personal blow for a sportsman like David, his disability did not stop him getting on with life. He went up to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he studied philosophy, politices and economics, assisted by good friends who carried him and his wheelchair up flights of stairs for lectures.
After graduating in 1959, he married Ann Harbord, whom he met when she was an English student at Oxford. He joined the civil service at the Department of Health in 1960 and became assistant secretary in 1973, dealing with the terms and conditions of hospital doctors. He was appointed secretary to the 1975 royal commission on the National Health Service and from 1979 to 1984 was under secretary at the DHSS. In 1984 he became director general of the Cancer Research Campaign (now Cancer Research UK), a role he fulfilled with distinction until his retirement in 1996.
He then continued to devote himself to public service, as vice-chairman of the Suffolk Health Authority and as a member of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Appeals Panel. He was a trustee of the Disabled Living Foundation and of Research into Ageing.
His last public role was as founder member and first chairman of the friends of the church in Middleton, a small village on the Essex/Suffolk border, where he and Ann lived after retirement. They were keen to see the church used as a centre of activities for the local community, which had few other amenities.
David loved good food and wine and had a permanent suntan acquired in or by the swimming pool and from the seat of his Triumph Stag convertible. He enjoyed many highly competitive games of garden croquet and racing demon.
He is survived by Ann and by his siblings, Andy, Jenny and me.
