The Steering Group
The Expert Panels
The Administration Team
Steering Group
The Archives Revealed programme is led by a Steering Group with responsibility for the governance of the programme and its strategic direction. Its members are:
Sue Bowers – Director of the Pilgrim Trust
Sue joined the Pilgrim Trust in 2020 from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, where she was most recently Director of Investment and Head of the National Heritage Memorial Fund. She has worked in the heritage and grant giving sectors throughout her career. Starting at the Museums and Galleries Commission, she then worked in local government before joining the Heritage Lottery Fund in 1994. Sue has a MA in Museum and Gallery Management, is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts, and sits on the Grants Panel of the Football Foundation. Sue chaired the Archives Revealed Panel 2020 to 2023.
Paul Ramsbottom OBE – Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation
(Photo credit: John Cairns)
Paul Ramsbottom is Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation, a charity which funds widely across research and education in the UK. Paul takes a wider interest in issues relating to philanthropy in the UK as a speaker and writer. He has undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in History from the University of Oxford.
Outside of philanthropy, he has an interest in international development which includes founding the Savannah Education Trust – a charity which works in West Africa – and sitting on the Board of Mercy Ships UK.He acts as a judge for the World’s Best School Prizes.His hometown university, the University of Bedfordshire, awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2013. In January 2020 he was awarded an OBE for services to charity.
Alistair Brown – Head of Museums, Libraries and Archives Policy at The National Lottery Heritage Fund
Alistair Brown leads the Heritage Fund’s policy on archives, museums and libraries and across the UK, and has supported the Fund’s delivery of a wide range of projects in the sector, including the Fund’s recent Dynamic Collections campaign. Prior to working at the Heritage Fund, Alistair was the Policy Manager for the Museums Association where he led on a range of policy initiatives including the review of the Code of Ethics for Museums, the delivery of the Museums Change Lives campaign, and a series of successful sector advocacy campaigns. He has also previously worked in cultural and regional policy roles for the Scottish Government and the European Commission.
Saul Nassé – Chief Executive and Keeper of The National Archives
As Keeper of Public Records, Saul is responsible for overseeing the integrity of the public records system of England, Wales and the United Kingdom. Saul leads a team of over 500 people, providing strategic vision for the organisation as it carries out its vital role as guardian of over 1,000 years of iconic national documents.
Saul has had an extensive career in education and media, having previously served as Group Chief Executive of Cambridge Assessment, the University’s examinations business, and as Chief Executive of Cambridge Assessment English. Prior to that, he was Controller of BBC Learning, running the department that commissioned and produced educational content including BBC Bitesize, Stargazing Live and BBC Food. During his time at the BBC, Saul oversaw the Domesday Reloaded project – inspired by one of our most famous documents – which brought online a vast multimedia archive from 1986, contributed by over a million members of the public.
Saul studied Natural Sciences at Robinson College, University of Cambridge and was a Fellow there from 2019 to 2024. He began his career at Cranfield University, before joining the BBC Science Department. In 1997, he became Editor of prime-time science show Tomorrow’s World, before moving on to be acting Head of Religion & Ethics and later General Manager of BBC Worldwide Productions in Mumbai, where he was responsible for the Indian version of Strictly Come Dancing.
TBC – Home Nations Representative
Expert Panel – Cataloguing and Consortium Grants
Applications to the Cataloguing and Consortium programmes are reviewed by an independent Expert Panel.
Chair – Dr Valerie Johnson
From 2015 – 2023, Valerie was Director of Research and Collections at The National Archives (TNA), having been promoted from her post as Head of Research at the same institution. Prior to that she worked on a history project based at the University of Cambridge, and has experience of the academic, corporate and public sectors.
As Director of Research, she was responsible for the research undertaken at TNA, and also held responsibility for the Archive Sector Development brief within her portfolio, delivering TNA’s archive sector leadership alongside the Chief Executive. Valerie has a professional qualification in archives, namely an MA in Archives Administration, for which she was awarded a Distinction, as well as the Alexander Myers Prize. A Registered Member of the Archives and Records Association since qualifying, she also has a PhD in History, for which she was also awarded the 2008 Coleman Prize. She is an elected Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and of the Society of Antiquaries.
Since 2023, she has held a role as Strategic Advisor to TNA, as well as working freelance as an independent consultant.
We are currently recruiting panellists for the Expert Panel. To enquire, email us at archivegrants@nationalarchives.go.uk
Expert Panel – Scoping Grants
Applications for Scoping Grants are reviewed by an expert panel from within The National Archives:
Zoe Fullard– Senior Archivist: Digital Development
Amy Sampson– Preventive Conservator
Dan Gosling– Principal Legal Records Specialist
Lucy Razzall– Collections Researcher
James Travers– Cultural Property Manager
Sarah Irwin– Digitisation Enquiries Liaison Officer
Archives Revealed Programme Administration
The administration of the Archives Revealed programme is managed by a dedicated teamat The National Archives. For enquiries about Archives Revealed, please contact us via email at: archivegrants@nationalarchives.gov.uk
Jack Butterworth – Head of Research, Grants and Academic Engagement
Jack is Head of Research, Grants and Academic Engagement at The National Archives, and the project lead for Archives Revealed. He is responsible for The National Archives’ research strategy and its engagement with its academic audiences, the higher education sector and other Independent Research Organisations. He also leads The National Archives’ grant fundraising for research, public engagement, digitisation and capital works programmes, and our funding programmes for the wider archives sector.
He is a research and research management professional, who has worked as the project manager of several large clinical studies in the UK and Africa, and latterly as Department Manager of the Department of Global Health and Development at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, leading professional services for a department of 135 academic staff with over £35 million in total grant funding. He joined The National Archives in 2021 to establish a new Grants and Funding Office, before adding the Research and Academic Engagement teams to his brief in 2023.
Jack has an MA in Music from Trinity College, Cambridge, and away from his desk, still performs regularly as a choral singer and as the organist of All Saints’ Church, Orpington.
Jack.Butterworth@nationalarchives.gov.uk
James Hodgson – Head of Archive Sector Funding
James has led the operations of the Archives Revealed programme for the last three years, including the design and delivery of our strategic funding review in 2022-23. James has over 15 years’ experience working on and managing international projects in the NGO sector, funded by the Government and other multinational institutions, including working in Cambodia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, Burundi, the United States of America and Australia.
James.Hodgson@nationalarchives.gov.uk
Programme Manager – Archives Revealed- To Be Recruited
Sector Development and Engagement Manager – Archives Revealed – To Be Recruited
Holly Staynor – Head of Process and Project Delivery
Holly supports the compliant management and delivery of The National Archives’ grants. She is a qualified project and programme manager with wide experience of grants in a government and charity context, including a £26 million grant scheme within the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy. She likes football, gardening and running.
Holly.Staynor@nationalarchives.gov.uk
Sophie Anstee de Mas, Grants and Funding Officer
Sophie supports the work of our grant teams, working to fund the archive sector as well as win bids to enable innovative internal research. She has worked on Archives Revealed for 2 years, managing the post-award delivery of its funding streams. In previous roles, Sophie has worked with other heritage organisations, such as English Heritage, Museums of Edinburgh, and the National Trust. She is currently also a Trustee and Treasurer for the British Association for Local History and sits on the Blue Plaques Panel for English Heritage.
Sophie.AnsteedeMas@nationalarchives.gov.uk
The delivery of Archives Revealed is supported by The National Archives Archive Sector Leadership department, who provide advice and guidance to the sector:
Contact the team – Archives sector (nationalarchives.gov.uk)
