The Appointment of Chair of the Board is made by His Majesty The King, following the recommendation of the Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.
DCMS is committed to eliminating discrimination and advancing equality of opportunity in its public appointments. We particularly encourage applicants from underrepresented groups, those based outside London and the South-East and applicants who have achieved success through non-traditional educational routes. This ensures that boards of public bodies benefit from a full range of diverse perspectives and are representative of the people they serve.
The previous Chair, Rupert Gavin, concluded seven years in office on 4 July 2022. Carole Souter, who has nearly seven years’ experience as a Trustee of HRP is currently serving as the Interim Chair. The new Chair will lead the Board of Trustees as we pursue a renewed focus on our charitable purpose and the public benefit that we bring.
Key accountabilities
- Board leadership: agreeing agendas for and chairing main Board meetings; Board effectiveness and Trustee appraisals, appointment/renewal of trustees; chairing the Nominations & Governance sub-committee, membership of the Finance & Investment sub-committee, and occasional attendance as observer at other board sub-committees.
- Working with the Chief Executive and Executive Board Directors: supporting and holding the Chief Executive to account, setting and reviewing annual objectives, routine working meetings (every two to three weeks), regular phone calls/emails for consultation and sharing information, support and guidance as required. Plus, occasionally working with Directors and senior managers when the Chair’s experience would be helpful.
- Fundraising: Leading (with others) prospect cultivation and donor stewardship at a senior level; building a group of Trustees that is committed to fundraising at Board and individual level.
- Visible leadership: inside and outside HRP – attending and speaking at HRP previews, openings, events; visits to projects, staff visits; attending external events on behalf of HRP.
- Senior stakeholder and partner relationships: acting as an ambassador for HRP, building and maintaining relationships with key stakeholders and partners (i.e.. The Royal Family and The Royal Household, government especially The Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport and Northern Ireland Office; secretaries of state and ministers; chairs of other organisations.
Term of office
Trustees’ appointments are for three years. They may serve second terms, if approved, and have this extended further in exceptional circumstances.
Time commitment
The time commitment is around one day per week (including attendance at events), spread across the year. The main Board meets four times a year (plus one for the accounts if necessary) and there are main sub committees covering Nominations, Finance & Investment, People and Audit & Risk, as well as other committees and working groups, which usually meet two or three times a year and to which the Chair is invited but may not always attend.
Office support
It is assumed that the Chair will have their own office and administrative support for business and interests beyond HRP, and for personal arrangements and convenience. However, HRP will provide the support necessary for Board matters, Chair’s correspondence and the provision of necessary documentation.
Historic Royal Palaces (HRP) is the custodian of some of the United Kingdom’s most well-known historic buildings: the Tower of London, Hampton Court Palace, Kensington Palace, the Banqueting House at Whitehall, Kew Palace and Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland. In recent times, it has welcomed five million people a year to the sites and reached many more off-site and online.
Our Cause is ‘stir every spirit to inspire and provoke change’, which challenges us to connect with people’s heads and hearts.
The five London palaces are owned by His Majesty The King in Right of Crown and are held for the benefit of the nation by the Government through the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. Hillsborough Castle is owned by the Government and is The King’s Official Residence in Northern Ireland.
HRP is a charity established by Royal Charter in 1998. Under the Royal Charter, HRP has two primary aims:
- to manage, conserve, renovate, repair, maintain and improve the palaces to a high standard consistent with their status as buildings of royal association and historic and/or architectural importance; and
- to help everyone learn about the palaces, the skills required for their conservation and the wider story of how monarchs and people together have shaped society by providing public access, by exhibition, by events and education programmes, by the preparation of records, by research and by publication, and by such other means as are appropriate.
Since 1998, HRP has been responsible for the five London palaces under a contract with the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. Responsibility for Hillsborough Castle is under a lease from the Northern Ireland Office.
HRP is also a public corporation and receives no public revenue funding: all costs are met by self-generated income. Turnover in 2019/20 was c. £100 million, the majority being from visitor admissions.
Like many other organisations, HRP was severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic; the palaces were closed for long periods and self-generated income dropped to £12m in 2020/21. A restructure in 2020 reduced the size of the organisation by 40% and expenditure was cut by a half. Financial losses were met from cash reserves, and a Culture Recovery Fund loan of £40m was taken out early in 2022 to provide stability.
Nonetheless, HRP has been a self-financing independent charity for over 20 years, with an extensive record of achievement and, after two years of losses, we returned to surplus in 2022/23. Our financial forecast for the years ahead is positive and, with confidence in our rapid recovery, we are making plans for a renewed focus on our charitable purpose, in which the new Chair will play an essential part.
Further information about HRP is available on its website; www.hrp.org.uk.
Governance
The Board of Trustees is responsible for the conduct and aims of the charity, although much of this is delegated to the Chief Executive on a day-to-day basis. The Chief Executive is also accountable to Parliament as Accounting Officer.
The charity cannot take part in party politics, and the separation from political activities and controversy is even greater for Historic Royal Palaces than for other charities due to its association with His Majesty The King.
The Board consists of a Chair and eleven Trustees, chosen for their skills and experience. All are non-executive and unpaid.
The Chair is appointed by HM The King on the advice of the Secretary of State. Four Trustees are appointed by HM The King, of whom three are ex-officio appointments: the Director of the Royal Collection; the Keeper of the Privy Purse and the Lord Chamberlain (unless he chooses not to take up the appointment, in which case HM The King may appoint someone to take his place, as currently). The remaining seven Trustees are appointed by the Secretary of State, two of whom are ex-officio; the Constable of the Tower of London and the Chair of the Campaign Board.
The strategy of the organisation is based on the simple but profound idea that we will root our work, more than ever, in our charitable purpose and the public benefit we bring, with a bold ambition to be for everyone, whoever and wherever they are. It will mean taking our work to new levels of reach and inclusion, investing in the programmes that will achieve this, and in the palaces, collections and content that we want everyone to enjoy. It will also mean pushing faster at the sustainability of our sites and our organisation so that we can play our part, with everyone, in the challenge of climate change.
Our self-funding model – in which income funds our charitable purpose, and our purpose gives meaning to making money – is strong, and makes every role in HRP, wherever it is, an important one.
The Board consists of the Chair and Ten trustees. The current interim chair Carole Souter CBE is supported by the board of trustees:
This post is regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments. For more information, please refer to the
Commissioner’s website 