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New arts & humanities research council chair appointed

11 December 2007

Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills, John Denham, today announced the appointment of Sir Alan Wilson FBA FRS as the new Chair of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

John Denham said:

I am delighted to welcome Sir Alan Wilson as Chair of the Arts and Humanities Research Council. His high level experience of research, government and academia makes him well qualified to provide a strong contribution to the leadership and work of AHRC.

Sir Alan said:

I am very honoured to have been offered this post and am delighted to accept. I believe that research in the arts and humanities underpins the quality of life in the UK and I am pleased to be able to contribute to such endeavours.

Sir Alan succeeds Sir Brian Follett. The appointment is for four years.

Notes to Editors

  1. The appointment has been made in accordance with the requirements of the Code of the Commissioner for Public Appointments. Sir Alan Wilson has not been involved in any relevant political activities in the last five years. All appointments are made on merit and political activity plays no part in the selection process. However, in accordance with the Nolan recommendations there is a requirement for appointees? political activity to be made public. As Chair he will receive an honorarium of £15,780 pa. He holds no other ministerial appointments.

  2. Biographical details

    Sir Alan graduated in Mathematics from Corpus Christi College Cambridge in 1960, following which he worked at the Rutherford Laboratory at Harwell on computational bubble chamber physics. He moved on in 1964 to the University of Oxford's Institute of Economics and Statistics as a Research Officer, and then in 1966 to London as Head of the Mathematical Advisory Unit at the Ministry of Transport. In 1967 he wrote his seminal paper 'A statistical theory of spatial distribution models', which continues to be essential reading for researchers in fields where flows of people, goods, information or money need to be predicted.

    In 1968 he became Assistant Director at the Centre for Environmental Studies in London. During this period he laid the foundations of rigorous, mathematical analysis of geographical systems, an approach which he would pioneer and promote for the next twenty years in a stream of conference presentations, papers and books.

    As Professor of Urban and Regional Geography at the University of Leeds in the 1970s and 1980s, he was one of a small number of academics with a genuinely international reputation. In 1991 he was appointed Vice-Chancellor of the university. Under his stewardship Leeds increased its student numbers, turnover and research income several times over. He was instrumental, with Sir Robert Ogden, in launching a scholarship scheme to encourage 16-year-olds from disadvantaged areas in South Yorkshire to stay on in school and then enter higher education. This scheme, later extended to North Yorkshire with help from the County Council and the Skipton Building Society, was the precursor of the Government's Education Maintenance Awards.

    His knowledge of the university sector led to his appointment as first Director General for Higher Education by the UK Government, a post which he took up in 2004. In this role he played a critical role in the government's drive to widen participation in higher education and maintain a world class education system. He is now Professor of Urban and Regional Systems at University College London. Sir Alan was elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy in 1994 and was knighted in 2001. In 2004, he was awarded the Laureat d'Honneur by the International Geographical Union and the 2004 Prize in Regional Science by the European Regional Science Association. In the same year he was also elected an Honorary Fellow of Corpus Christi College. In May 2006 Sir Alan was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

  3. The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) is the UK's leading publicly funded arts and humanities research organisation. AHRC provides the highest-quality research on issues of importance to business, the public sector and government. It produces world-class researchers through its commitment to excellence in training. AHRC promotes public awareness of the arts and humanities. AHRC works alongside other Research Councils with responsibility for other areas of research. The Research Councils work collectively on issues of common concern via Research Councils UK. More information about AHRC can be found at http://www.ahrc.ac.uk
  4. For more information, contact Rhys Stacker in the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) press office on 0203 300 8105. Public enquiries: DIUS enquiries line 020 7215 5555.