Moira Paul Wallace, OBE (born 15 August 1961) is a former British civil servant and academic administrator. She was Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, from 2013 to 2018. [1] Until October 2012 she was the first Permanent Secretary of the Department of Energy and Climate Change, having moved from her role as Director General of the Crime Reduction and Community Safety Group the Home Office in November 2008.
Wallace was born on 15 August 1961. She studied modern languages at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, graduating in 1983, and studied comparative literature at Harvard University as a Kennedy Scholar, completing her Master of Arts (AM) in 1985. [2]
Wallace was appointed Permanent Secretary of the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) on 13 November 2008. Before that Wallace had undertaken 10 years in HM Treasury, including three years as Private Secretary to Nigel Lawson and John Major when each was Chancellor of the Exchequer. She was Economic Affairs Private Secretary to the Prime Minister from 1995 to 1997. She established and led the Cabinet Office Social Exclusion Unit from 1997 to 2002, and joined the Home Office in 2002. From 2002 to 2005 she ran the Office for Criminal Justice Reform, a joint venture between the three criminal justice departments. From 2005 she was Home Office Director General for Crime and Policing. [3]
She was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 1997 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours in August 1997.
She announced her resignation from the DECC on 19 July 2012. [4] It was rumoured that her departure was prompted by the conflicting views of various politicians in charge of the DECC, especially over subsidies for renewable energy, and promoting the continued use of gas (most controversially from fracking).[ citation needed ] She was given a 'golden goodbye' of almost £500,000, thought to be the most ever paid to a civil servant to quit early. [5]
On 25 February 2013 it was announced that Wallace would be the first female Provost of Oriel College, Oxford University. She took up the post in September 2013. [6] In January 2016 there was criticism that there had been a lack of proper leadership over the handling of the Rhodes Must Fall campaign demanding the removal of a statue of Cecil Rhodes. It was reported that donors might withhold some £100m in anger at the suggestion that the College might give in to the campaign, and the chair of the Commons Select Committee on Education said that she should consider her position, as the College had allowed the issue to spiral out of control. [7] There have been calls from academics for her to resign. [8] It was also reported that the College might have to make staff redundant as a result of the loss of donor income. [9] She stepped down as Provost in August 2018, and was succeeded by Neil Mendoza. [10]
In 2014 she was elected an honorary fellow of Trinity College Dublin. [11]
Oriel College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in Oxford, England. Located in Oriel Square, the college has the distinction of being the oldest royal foundation in Oxford. In recognition of this royal connection, the college has also been historically known as King's College and King's Hall. The reigning monarch of the United Kingdom is the official visitor of the college.
Cecil John Rhodes was a British mining magnate and politician in southern Africa who served as Prime Minister of the Cape Colony from 1890 to 1896.
The Rhodes Scholarship is an international postgraduate award for students to study at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom.
Sir Zelman Cowen, was an Australian legal scholar and university administrator who served as the 19th Governor-General of Australia, in office from 1977 to 1982.
A provost is a senior academic administrator. At many institutions of higher education, they are the chief academic officer, a role that may be combined with being deputy to the chief executive officer. They may also be the chief executive officer of a university, of a branch campus of a university, or of a college within a university.
Sir Derek James Morris is former Chairman of the Competition Commission and was the Provost of Oriel College, Oxford until Moira Wallace replaced him in 2013.
Kenneth Turpin was a Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, from 1957 to 1980. He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1966 to 1969.
Philip Alexander Hunt, Baron Hunt of Kings Heath, is a former health administrator and a Labour Co-operative member of the House of Lords.
Dame Helen Frances Ghosh, DCB is a former British civil servant who has been Master of Balliol College, Oxford since 2018. She was previously Director-General of the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty from November 2012 to April 2018.
Donald John Markwell is an Australian social scientist, who has been described as a "renowned Australian educational reformer". He was appointed Head of St Mark's College, Adelaide, from November 2019. He was Senior Adviser to the Leader of the Government in the Australian Senate from October 2015 to December 2017, and was previously Senior Adviser on Higher Education to the Australian Minister for Education.
Kennedy Scholarships provide full funding for up to ten British post-graduate students to study at either Harvard University or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Susan Hockfield, the sixteenth president of MIT, described the scholarship program as a way to "offer exceptional students unique opportunities to broaden their intellectual and personal horizons, in ways that are more important than ever in an era defined by global interaction.". In 2007, 163 applications were received, of which 10 were ultimately selected, for an acceptance rate of 6.1%.
Neil Francis Jeremy Mendoza, Baron Mendoza, is a British businessman, academic administrator, and member of the House of Lords.
Alex Chisholm is a British civil servant and regulator, who has served as Cabinet Office Permanent Secretary and the chief operating officer of the United Kingdom's Civil Service since April 2020.
Ernest Wilson Nicholson, was a British scholar of the Old Testament and Church of England priest. He was Oriel Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture at the University of Oxford from 1979 to 1990 and served as Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, from 1990 to 2003.
Rhodes Must Fall was a protest movement that began on 9 March 2015, originally directed against a statue at the University of Cape Town (UCT) that commemorates Cecil Rhodes. The campaign for the statue's removal received global attention and led to a wider movement to "decolonise" education across South Africa. On 9 April 2015, following a UCT Council vote the previous night, the statue was removed.
Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union or, informally, Brexit Secretary, was a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the business of the Department for Exiting the European Union, as well as for the UK's withdrawal from the European Union (EU), informally referred to as "Brexit". The secretary of state oversaw Brexit negotiations following a 2016 referendum, in which a majority voted in favour of exiting the EU. The officeholder was a member of the Cabinet.
Carole Souter is the current Interim Chair of Historic Royal Palaces and former Master of St Cross College, Oxford, and Chief Executive of the National Heritage Memorial Fund and Heritage Lottery Fund.
Philip Wynn Owen, CB was a Member of the European Court of Auditors from January 2014 to January 2020. He was previously a British civil servant from 1981 to 2013.
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One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text published under the British Open Government Licence : "Moira Wallace Permanent Secretary". Department of Energy and Climate Change. Archived from the original on 2 April 2010. Retrieved 16 May 2011.