How Oliver Dowden became secretary of state for the culture wars
Remain-supporting politician has become foot soldier in Cabinet’s attacks against ‘woke’ policies
When the Museum of the Home in London’s Shoreditch wanted to remove the statue of the slave shipowner Sir Robert Geffrye that adorns the front of its building, the charity’s trustees received a strong warning from the culture secretary.
“The government believes that it is always legitimate to examine and debate Britain’s history, but that removing statues, artwork and other historical objects is not the right approach,” Oliver Dowden wrote to the board last summer. “As a government-funded organisation, I. would expect you to be mindful of the above approach.”
The museum trustees, who had expressed concerns about the Geffrye’s continued presence in a racially diverse area following the Black Lives Matter protests, reluctantly chose to keep the statue – and avoided any government threat to their funding
The incident is yet another moment in the public rise of Dowden – a frequent foot soldier in the “culture wars”.
His profile has grown in parallel with Boris Johnson’s willingness to mobilise the government machine behind divisive topics that fill the day’s headlines and let ministers rail against “woke” policies – and draw a cultural dividing line with Labour.
In the 16 months since he was unexpectedly promoted to the cabinet, Dowden has warned museums to “retain and explain” controversial statues, successfully argued the BBC should keep the lyrics from Land of Hope and Glory at the Last Night of the Proms, and made the unprecedented decision to intervene in the selection for the England cricket team by expressing regret over the decision to drop Ollie Robinson over historic racist tweets.
He has also ordered the union flag to be flown on UK government buildings every day, blocked reappointments of government-appointed trustees to museum boards who were deemed to be hostile, and relaunched the entire hiring process for the chair of media regulator Ofcom after the government’s preferred candidate, the former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre, failed to make the cut.
Extracted from: https://www.theguardian.com
The following passage can be understood as:
“His profile has grown in parallel with Boris Johnson’s willingness to mobilise the government machine behind divisive topics that fill the day’s headlines and let ministers rail against “woke” policies – and draw a cultural dividing line with Labour.”