Education
Trend was educated at Whitgift School and Merton College, Oxford, where he took first class honours in Classics.
Trend was educated at Whitgift School and Merton College, Oxford, where he took first class honours in Classics.
He then joined the Civil Service, spending most of his career in the Treasury. He became Cabinet Secretary under both Harold Wilson and Ted Heath between 1963 to 1973. On 7 March 1974 he was created a life peer as Baron Trend, of Greenwich in Greater London.
He led an investigation in the 1970s into allegations of penetration of the British Secret Services from before World World War II until the 1960s.
His conclusion was that there was insufficient evidence to support the allegations. Peter Wright in his memoirs, Spycatcher, discusses Trend and his report.
Trend married Patricia Charlotte Shaw in 1949. They had three children.