Frazer Hay in conversation with Sir John Whittingdale, as part of 10 Stories for 10 Years.
On a grey Thursday morning in Westminster, I met The Rt Hon Sir John Whittingdale OBE MP online, only minutes after he had spoken in Parliament during Department for Business and Trade Questions. As we talked, he sat in his office in Portcullis House against a backdrop of timber panelling and parliamentary formality, speaking to me about the Cultural Protection Fund, a project he had helped bring into existence more than a decade earlier.
Behind him, hanging quietly from a hook, was a quintessential black umbrella. It struck me as oddly symbolic; practical, understated and unmistakably British. We were discussing the protection of global cultural heritage while surrounded by British cultural heritage itself: parliamentary buildings, constitutional rituals, historic institutions, centuries of continuity layered into walls, language and custom. It felt faintly surreal and somehow entirely fitting.
Sir John was generous, thoughtful and deeply reflective throughout our conversation. Though his profile differs slightly from the others in this series, because it concerns the creation of the Cultural Protection Fund itself rather than a specific funded project, the same themes soon emerged: identity, memory, responsibility, continuity and the protection of what conflict tries to erase.
Sir John was generous, thoughtful and deeply reflective throughout our conversation. We talked about the creation of the Cultural Protection Fund and touched on themes of identity, memory, responsibility, continuity, and the protection of what conflict so often seeks to erase.
The immediate origins of the Cultural Protection Fund lay in the violence unfolding across Syria and Iraq during the rise of ISIS. Ancient sites, museums, archives and monuments were being deliberately targeted. Palmyra, in particular, became emblematic of the destruction. The assault was not only military or territorial. It was cultural. Entire histories and identities were under attack.
Sir John recalled that period vividly. There was growing recognition within government, museums and cultural institutions that heritage itself had become a battlefield.
‘Palmyra became a sort of symbol of that,’ he told me.
The figure who worked most closely with him during the Fund’s creation was Neil MacGregor, then Director of the British Museum. Together, they began shaping what would eventually become the CPF. MacGregor brought not only expertise, but also moral conviction and international authority. George Osborne, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, proved supportive, recognising both the value of culture and Britain’s unique expertise in heritage protection. David Cameron was also supportive, while discussions with the Department for International Development were crucial in securing Official Development Assistance funding.
Listening to Sir John describe the process, I was struck by how much persuasion, diplomacy and coalition-building were required simply to allow the Fund to exist. The CPF did not emerge quickly or automatically. It had to be argued for, defended and justified across government departments, Treasury discussions and Whitehall processes.
What ultimately helped secure support was a growing understanding that cultural heritage is not secondary to people’s lives, but deeply tied to them.
‘Heritage and culture are so important to the identity of a people,’ Sir John explained. ‘Protecting culture is of huge importance to preserve a civilisation and to allow people to maintain a sense of identity.’
That understanding remains central to the Fund today.
At one point in our conversation, Sir John spoke about a meeting that had clearly remained with him. In November 2015, he met Dr Maamoun AbdulKarim, Syria’s Director-General of Antiquities and Museums, shortly after the murder of Khaled al-Asaad, the archaeologist who had dedicated his life to protecting Palmyra. Refusing to abandon the site as ISIS advanced, al-Asaad was detained, tortured and eventually beheaded after refusing to reveal where treasures had been hidden.
The emotional weight of that meeting still lingered in Sir John’s voice as he described it.
‘It brought home how serious the threat was to the remnants of the very beginning of civilisation.’
The conversation moved naturally toward broader questions of conflict, identity and memory. Sir John reflected on Ukraine, Afghanistan, Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, places where heritage has become entangled in struggles over nationhood and historical legitimacy. Churches, monuments, archives and museums are not only casualties of war; they are often deliberate targets.
‘The Russians have attempted to destroy the cultural identity of Ukraine,’ he said. ‘It is an attempt to wipe out a people.’
It was striking how closely this perspective echoed the views expressed by others throughout the CPF series. Again and again, interviewees have returned to the idea that cultural heritage is not ornamental. It is foundational. It gives people continuity, belonging and recognition. Without it, societies lose part of their ability to understand themselves.
For Sir John, these ideas were not abstract political concepts. His own relationship with heritage began in childhood.
Born and raised in Dorset, he grew up surrounded by landscapes and historic places that quietly shaped his understanding of Britain’s past. He spoke warmly about visiting National Trust properties, historic houses, castles and gardens with his father on Sunday afternoons.
‘I have always had an interest since a young age,’ he reflected.
Sherborne Abbey, dominating the town where he grew up, left a particular impression on him. He described its fan-vaulted roof and the sense of history embedded within it. Later came Winchester College and Winchester Cathedral, spaces equally marked by architectural and cultural continuity.
‘I used to sing in choirs when I was young,’ he told me. ‘We would do those in Winchester Cathedral.’
These details mattered. Across all the profiles in this series, formative encounters with place repeatedly emerge as shaping forces. For Sir John, heritage was never merely professional policy territory. It was something experienced physically and emotionally long before politics entered his life.
His political journey itself is unusually tied to cultural life. Most ministers move repeatedly between departments throughout their careers. Sir John spent the overwhelming majority of his parliamentary life connected to what became the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. He served as Shadow Secretary of State, chaired the DCMS Select Committee for a decade, and later became Secretary of State himself before returning twice more as a minister.
That continuity gave him an unusually deep relationship with the cultural sector.
‘I’ve had a long experience and involvement with one government department,’ he reflected, ‘which is probably greater than almost any other person in politics.’
Throughout our conversation, another theme quietly surfaced again and again: collaboration. Sir John consistently framed the CPF not as an individual achievement, but as the result of many people working together. Neil MacGregor, George Osborne, civil servants, museum professionals, ministers, and later the British Council all played essential roles.
‘You have to be,’ he told me when I suggested he seemed instinctively collaborative. ‘To establish something like the CPF, you need to bring together a lot of different aspects and people with different strengths.’
That collaborative mindset perhaps explains why the CPF has endured despite repeated financial pressures. Sir John spoke candidly about his concerns regarding the British Council’s financial difficulties and the vulnerability that creates for the Fund. Yet he also spoke with genuine pride about what the CPF has achieved internationally.
‘The CPF is a very good example of UK soft power,’ he said. ‘The fact that it is Britain helping other countries to protect and preserve their own heritage assets, I think, is a tremendous activity.’
Importantly, he did not frame this in triumphalist terms. Rather, he saw it as a form of responsibility: Britain using its expertise to support other societies in protecting their own identities and histories.
As our conversation drew to a close, I asked him about the motto of his old school: Niti Est Nitere — To Strive is to Shine.
The phrase lingered with me afterwards because it seemed, in many ways, to describe the Cultural Protection Fund itself.
Over the past decade, the CPF has worked quietly across conflict zones, fragile states and endangered heritage landscapes, often far from public attention. It has helped communities preserve languages, traditions, archives, buildings, artefacts and memories under threat. It has recognised that cultural heritage is not separate from human wellbeing, but part of what allows societies to endure and rebuild.
Speaking with Sir John, I was left with the sense that the CPF emerged not simply from policy machinery, but from a deeper recognition that culture matters profoundly in moments of crisis. Wars are often fought not only over territory, but over identity, memory and belonging. Protecting heritage, therefore, is not an optional luxury. It is part of protecting civilisation itself.
And perhaps that is why this conversation, held virtually in the heart of Westminster beneath centuries of British institutional heritage, felt so resonant.
Because at its best, the Cultural Protection Fund is not only protecting the past.
It is helping protect the possibility of cultural continuity in the future.
