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John Whittingdale

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Sir John Flasby Lawrance Whittingdale OBE (born 16 October 1959) is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Maldon (and its predecessors) since 1992 and Shadow Minister for Health and Social Care since July 2024.[1] He previously served as Culture Secretary from 2015 to 2016. Whittingdale was most recently Minister of State for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries and Minister of State for Data and Digital Infrastructure from May to December 2023, during the maternity leave of Julia Lopez.[2]

The Right Honourable
Sir John Whittingdale
OBE MP
Official portrait, 2024
Shadow Minister for Health and Social Care
Incumbent
Assumed office
19 July 2024
LeaderRishi Sunak
Minister of State for Data and Digital Infrastructure
In office
9 May 2023 – 20 December 2023[a]
Prime MinisterRishi Sunak
Preceded byJulia Lopez
Succeeded byJulia Lopez
Minister of State for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries[b]
In office
9 May 2023 – 20 December 2023[a]
Prime MinisterRishi Sunak
Preceded byJulia Lopez
Succeeded byJulia Lopez
In office
14 February 2020 – 16 September 2021
Prime MinisterBoris Johnson
Preceded byNigel Adams
Succeeded byJulia Lopez
Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
In office
11 May 2015 – 13 July 2016
Prime MinisterDavid Cameron
Preceded bySajid Javid
Succeeded byKaren Bradley
Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee
In office
14 July 2005 – 11 May 2015
Preceded byGerald Kaufman
Succeeded byJesse Norman
Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
In office
19 June 2004 – 6 May 2005
LeaderMichael Howard
Preceded byJulie Kirkbride
Succeeded byTheresa May
In office
23 July 2002 – 6 November 2003
LeaderIain Duncan Smith
Preceded byTim Yeo
Succeeded byJulie Kirkbride
Shadow Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
In office
18 September 2001 – 23 July 2002
LeaderIain Duncan Smith
Preceded byDavid Heathcoat-Amory
Succeeded byTim Yeo
Member of Parliament
for Maldon
Maldon and East Chelmsford (1997–2010)
South Colchester and Maldon (1992–1997)
Incumbent
Assumed office
9 April 1992
Preceded byJohn Wakeham
Majority6,906 (13.9%)
Political Secretary to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
In office
1988–1990
Prime MinisterMargaret Thatcher
Preceded byStephen Sherbourne
Succeeded byJudith Chaplin
Personal details
Born (1959-10-16) 16 October 1959 (age 65)
Sherborne, Dorset, England
Political partyConservative
Spouse
Ancilla Murfitt
​
​
(m. 1990, divorced)​
Children2
EducationSandroyd School and Winchester College
Alma materUniversity College London

Whittingdale has been an MP since the 1992 general election, for a series of constituencies centred on the town of Maldon, Essex. He was Vice-Chairman of the 1922 Committee. He was a member of the Executive of Conservative Way Forward (2005–2010) and the Conservative Party Board (2006–2010).

Whittingdale served as Chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee from 2005 to 2015. He was appointed Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport by Prime Minister David Cameron in May 2015. He was one of the six Cabinet ministers to come out in favour of Brexit during the 2016 EU referendum and was afterwards a supporter of the Eurosceptic campaign Leave Means Leave. He was dismissed in July 2016 by incoming-Prime Minister Theresa May.

Early life and career

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John Whittingdale was born on 16 October 1959,[3] in Sherborne, Dorset.[4] He is the only son of John Whittingdale FRCS (1894–1974)[5] and Margaret Esme Scott (1920–), née Napier. On his mother's side, Whittingdale is in distant remainder to the lordship of Napier.[6]

Whittingdale was privately educated at both Sandroyd School[7] and Winchester College, followed by University College London (UCL) where he was Chairman of UCL Conservative Society. He graduated with a 2:2 in Economics in 1982.[8][9]

From 1982 to 1984, Whittingdale was head of the political section of the Conservative Research Department. He then served as Special Adviser to three successive Secretaries of State for Trade and Industry, Norman Tebbit (1984–1985); Leon Brittan (1985–1986), and Paul Channon (1986–1987). He worked on international privatisation at NM Rothschild in 1987 and in January 1988, became Political Secretary to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Upon her resignation Whittingdale was appointed Order of the British Empire and continued to serve as her Political Secretary until being elected to Parliament in 1992.[10]

Parliamentary career

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At the 1992 general election, Whittingdale was elected as MP for South Colchester and Maldon with 54.8% of the vote and a majority of 21,821.[11][12] After the election, he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to Eric Forth, Minister of State for Education and Employment, but resigned after voting against the Government for an amendment that would have allowed media publishers with more than a 20% share of the national press market to buy an ITV company.[13]

Prior to the 1997 general election, Whittingdale's constituency of South Colchester and Maldon was abolished and replaced with Maldon and East Chelmsford. Whittingdale was elected at the 1997 general election as MP for Maldon and East Chelmsford with 48.7% of the vote and a majority of 10,039.[14] In 1999, Whittingdale became Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition, succeeding David Lidington.[15]

At the 2001 general election, Whittingdale was re-elected as MP for Maldon and East Chelmsford with an increased vote share of 49.2% and a decreased majority of 8,462.[16] He was again re-elected at the 2005 general election, with an increased vote share of 51.5% and an increased majority of 12,573.[17]

Prior to the 2010 general election, Whittingdale's constituency of Maldon and East Chelmsford was abolished and replaced with Maldon. At the general election, Whittingdale was elected as MP for Maldon with 59.8% of the vote and a majority of 19,407.[18][19]

In April 2011 Whittingdale called for a public inquiry into phone hacking at the News of the World and to why a series of investigations by Scotland Yard failed to link any News International employees to phone hacking other than the News of the World's former royal editor, Clive Goodman. Whittingdale said: "There are some very big questions; what I find [most] worrying is the apparent unwillingness of the police, who had the evidence and chose to do nothing with it. That's something that needs to be looked into."[20]

In 2012, Whittingdale was Chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Privacy and Injunctions. From 2012 to 2019 he was Vice Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Intellectual Property Group.[21]

Whittingdale was among the 175 MPs who voted against the Same-sex Marriage Bill in 2013.[22]

In 2014, Whittingdale along with six other Conservative MPs voted against the Equal Pay (Transparency) Bill which would require all companies with more than 250 employees to declare the gap in pay between the average male and average female salaries.[23]

At the 2015 general election, Whittingdale was re-elected as MP for Maldon with an increased vote share of 60.6% and an increased majority of 22,070.[24]

Whittingdale was in favour of Brexit during the 2016 EU membership referendum.[25] Following the referendum, he was one of several Conservative MPs who signed a letter to Prime Minister Theresa May urging that the UK withdraw from both the European single market and the Customs Union. After the referendum, Whittingdale was a supporter of the Eurosceptic campaign Leave Means Leave.[26]

At the snap 2017 general election, Whittingdale was again re-elected with an increased vote share of 67.9% and an increased majority of 23,430.[27] He was again re-elected at the 2019 general election with an increased vote share of 72% and an increased majority of 30,041.[28] Whittingdale was again re-elected at the 2024 general election, with a decreased vote share of 38.9% and a decreased majority of 6,906.[29]

Media Select Committee

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On 14 July 2005[30] Whittingdale became the chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee. In this role he led the committee's investigation in 2009 and 2010 into libel and privacy issues, including the News International phone hacking scandal after The Guardian first revealed the extent of the practice at the News of the World. He was alleged to have warned members of the committee to consider not compelling former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks to testify due to the potential risk that their personal lives would be investigated in revenge, but has strongly denied the accusation.[31]

With just one out of three of News International's senior executives agreeing to appear before the committee session on 19 July, Whittingdale took the rarely used step of issuing a summons to compel the Murdochs to attend.[32] Whittingdale said Select Committees had taken such steps against individuals in the past and they had complied and continued "I hope very much that the Murdochs will respond similarly."[33] They both did, on 19 July, in what one paper described as the most important Select Committee hearing in parliamentary history.[34]

For its successful work on the phone hacking scandal, Whittingdale accepted The Spectator's 2011 "Inquisitor of the Year" award on behalf of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee.

Culture Secretary

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Whittingdale was appointed Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport by Prime Minister David Cameron on 11 May 2015.[35] He was sworn in to the Privy Council following his appointment.[36]

In April 2016, Shadow Culture Secretary Maria Eagle called for Whittingdale to recuse himself from decisions regarding the outcome of the Leveson Inquiry into press ethics because the story about Whittingdale's former girlfriend being a sex worker exposed him to pressure from the press.[37] A week later, it emerged that Whittingdale had accepted hospitality from the Lap Dancing Association in about 2008 at which time Whittingdale and two other MPs visited two clubs in one evening, while the industry's licensing was under investigation by the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee. The hospitality was not declared in the Register of members' interests, or later when Whittingdale later spoke out in the Commons against new regulations introduced by the Labour Government.[38][39]

On 14 July 2016, Whittingdale was dismissed from his position as Culture Secretary by the new prime minister, Theresa May.[25]

In July 2016, shortly after his dismissal, The Guardian criticised Whittingdale over his decision to turn down a request from the Daily Mirror for the release of historic documents relating to Mark Thatcher's dealings with the government of Oman in the 1980s. Roy Greenslade wrote that few, "apart from the man himself and his friends", could disagree with the argument that the public had a right to know.[40]

Whittingdale returned to the DCMS in February 2020, but as a minister of state rather than secretary of state. He was the minister of state for media and data.[41] Having left the department in 2021, Whittingdale once again returned to DCMS in May 2023, being appointed Acting Minister of State for Media, Tourism and Creative Industries, as well as Minister of State at the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, effective when Julia Lopez took maternity leave.[42]

Personal life

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Whittingdale married Ancilla Campbell Murfitt, a nurse and school governor, in 1990; the couple had two children before their divorce.[43][8] Whittingdale's half-brother is Charles Napier, former treasurer of the defunct Paedophile Information Exchange, who was most recently convicted of child sexual abuse offences in November 2014.[44]

On 12 April 2016, British media reported Whittingdale had been involved in a relationship with a female sex worker between August 2013 and February 2014. In a statement to the BBC's Newsnight programme, he said he had been unaware of his girlfriend's true occupation after meeting her through Match.com, and that he had ended the relationship after he had discovered it through reports that the story was being offered for publication to tabloids.[37][45] On 13 April 2016, David Cameron's spokesman said, "John Whittingdale's view was that this was in the past, and had been dealt with."[46]

Whittingdale is a member of the Church of England.

Honours

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Notes

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  1. ^ a b In accordance with the Ministerial and other Maternity Allowances Act 2021 Whittingdale temporarily served during Lopez's maternity leave.
  2. ^ Minister of State for Media and Data (2020-2021)

References

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  1. ^ "Conservative Party announces interim Opposition Front Bench". policymogul.com. Retrieved 25 July 2024.
  2. ^ "Ministerial Appointments: April 2023". GOV.UK. Retrieved 21 April 2023.
  3. ^ "Democracy Live: Your representatives: John Whittingdale". BBC News. Archived from the original on 27 July 2014. Retrieved 21 November 2012.
  4. ^ Waller, Robert; Criddle, Byron (2007). The Almanac of British Politics. Taylor & Francis. p. 650. ISBN 978-1135206833.
  5. ^ "Whittingdale, John (1894 - 1974)". livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk.
  6. ^ Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage, 2008, ed. Charles Kidd, Christine Shaw, Debrett's, p. 1042
  7. ^ "Sandroyd School's list of Distinguished Alumni". Archived from the original on 28 October 2010.
  8. ^ a b Plunkett, John (18 May 2015). "John Whittingdale, the horror fan putting the frighteners on the BBC". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 April 2016.
  9. ^ "John Whittingdale MP". WPR. Archived from the original on 17 July 2015. Retrieved 12 January 2015.
  10. ^ "John Whittingdale, Esq, OBE, MP Authorised Biography". Debrett's. Archived from the original on 14 May 2015. Retrieved 27 May 2022.
  11. ^ "Election Data 1992". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 15 October 2011. Retrieved 28 June 2017.
  12. ^ "Politics Resources". Election 1992. Politics Resources. 9 April 1992. Retrieved 6 December 2010.
  13. ^ Sieghart, Mary Ann (18 July 2011). "Mary Ann Sieghart: And the real winners will be ..." The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022. Retrieved 27 May 2022.
  14. ^ "Election Data 1997". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 15 October 2011. Retrieved 18 October 2015.
  15. ^ https://www.newspapers.com/image/719994975/
  16. ^ "Election Data 2001". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 15 October 2011. Retrieved 18 October 2015.
  17. ^ "Election Data 2005". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 15 October 2011. Retrieved 18 October 2015.
  18. ^ "Election Data 2010". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 26 July 2013. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
  19. ^ "BBC News | Election 2010 | Constituency | Maldon". news.bbc.co.uk.
  20. ^ Halliday, Josh (13 April 2011). "News of the World phone hacking: John Whittingdale seeks public inquiry". The Guardian.
  21. ^ "Officers". All Party Parliamentary Intellectual Property Group. Retrieved 15 May 2019.
  22. ^ Rogers, Simon (6 February 2013). "Gay marriage bill: how did your MP vote? Map". The Guardian. Retrieved 18 April 2015.
  23. ^ Saul, Heather (16 December 2014). "Equal Pay: Seven male Tory MPs vote against bill to make big companies reveal gender pay gap". The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022. Retrieved 18 April 2015.
  24. ^ "Election Data 2015". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 17 October 2015. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
  25. ^ a b "Theresa May's cabinet: Who's in and who's out?". BBC News. 14 July 2016. Retrieved 14 July 2016.
  26. ^ "Co-Chairmen - Political Advisory Board - Supporters". Leave Means Leave. Archived from the original on 24 October 2017. Retrieved 14 December 2017.
  27. ^ Council, Maldon District. "Election Results 2017 | Maldon District Council". www.maldon.gov.uk. Retrieved 14 March 2024.
  28. ^ "Maldon Parliamentary constituency". BBC News. BBC. Retrieved 19 November 2019.
  29. ^ "Maldon - General election results 2024". BBC News. Retrieved 15 July 2024.
  30. ^ "www.parliament.uk" (PDF).
  31. ^ Knowles, Daniel (18 July 2011). "The MPs who will take on the Murdochs". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 31 July 2011.
  32. ^ "Committee calls Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and Rebekah Brooks". UK Parliament.
  33. ^ Mulholland, Hélène (14 July 2011). "Phone hacking: Rupert Murdoch summoned to appear before MPs". The Guardian.
  34. ^ Sparrow, Andrew; Owen, Paul; Wells, Matt (19 July 2011). "Phone hacking: Murdochs and Rebekah Brooks face MPs". The Guardian.
  35. ^ "John Whittingdale becomes UK culture secretary". BBC News. 11 May 2015. Retrieved 27 May 2022.
  36. ^ "Privy Council appointments: May 2015". GOV.UK. Retrieved 27 May 2022.
  37. ^ a b "Minister John Whittingdale admits relationship with sex worker". BBC News. 12 April 2016. Retrieved 12 April 2016.
  38. ^ Watts, Joseph (19 April 2016). "John Whittingdale caught in lapdance club row". Evening Standard. Retrieved 19 April 2016.
  39. ^ Wright, Oliver (19 April 2016). "John Whittingdale admits to taking free dinner with performers at lapdance club". The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022. Retrieved 19 April 2016.
  40. ^ Greenslade, Roy (21 July 2016). "Why should files on Mark Thatcher (and Profumo) remain secret?". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
  41. ^ "Minister of State (Minister for Media and Data)". GOV.UK. Retrieved 7 January 2021.
  42. ^ "Ministerial Appointments: April 2023". GOV.UK. 24 April 2023. Retrieved 26 April 2023.
  43. ^ "Vote 2001: Candidate; John Whittingdale". BBC News. Retrieved 2 April 2016.
  44. ^ "Charles Napier admits string of historic sex offences against boys". The Telegraph. 18 November 2014. Retrieved 13 April 2016.
  45. ^ Dominiczak, Peter (13 April 2016). "John Whittingdale had relationship with 'dominatrix'". The Telegraph.
  46. ^ Booth, Robert; Stewart, Heather (13 April 2016). "Whittingdale didn't tell PM about relationship with sex worker, No 10 says". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 13 April 2016.
  47. ^ "No. 52371". The London Gazette (Supplement). 21 December 1990. p. 19582.
  48. ^ Tilbrook, Richard (14 May 2015). "ORDERS APPROVED AND BUSINESS TRANSACTED AT THE PRIVY COUNCIL HELD BY THE QUEEN AT BUCKINGHAM PALACE ON 14TH MAY 2015" (PDF). The Privy Council Office. Retrieved 21 November 2022.
  49. ^ "Political Honours conferred: October 2022". GOV.UK. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  50. ^ Laurenson, Jack (5 September 2019). "Jack Laurenson: Ukraine's Friend and Foe of the Week". KyivPost. Retrieved 25 February 2020.
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Government offices
Preceded by Political Secretary to the Prime Minister
1988–1990 		Succeeded by
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Member of Parliament
for Colchester South and Maldon
1992–1997 		Constituency abolished
Constituency established Member of Parliament
for Maldon and East Chelmsford
1997–2010
Member of Parliament
for Maldon
2010–present 		Incumbent
Political offices
Preceded by Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition
1999–2001 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Shadow Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
2001–2002 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
2002–2003 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
2004–2005 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
2015–2016 		Succeeded by
Preceded byas Minister of State for Sport, Media and Creative Industries Minister of State for Media and Data
2020–2021 		Succeeded by
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