Sir Maurice Hodgson, who has died aged 94, was a reforming chairman of ICI during the 1970s and 80s, despite a serious eye complaint that left him close to blindness. In 1981 he shocked the City by cutting the ICI dividend when the company was the flagship of British industry, but he laid the foundations for its renaissance later in the decade under his successors. Later he mounted a brief but unsuccessful attempt to revive Dunlop as an independent company, and was chairman of British Home Stores (now BHS) for five years.
Hodgson became chairman in 1978, after a decade in which ICI had variously tried a dash for growth, expensive and ultimately futile downstream investments in the textile industry, and significant international expansion. His predecessor, Sir Rowland Wright, had been a stop-gap. But as general manager and then director responsible for planning, Hodgson had started to bring the rival investment demands of competing ICI baronies under better control.
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