St John's welcomes new Honorary Fellows

On Friday 16 May, the President and Senior Members of St John's hosted a dinner to welcome two new Honorary Fellows to the College. Sir Chris Wormald KCB (History, 1987) and Henry Dimbleby MBE (Physics and Philosophy, 1989) are both notable for their distinction and we are delighted to welcome them back to St John's.

Sir Chris Wormald KCB

Sir Chris Wormald was appointed Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service in December 2024.

Before this he served as Permanent Secretary at the Department of Health (now Department of Health and Social Care). He has also served as Permanent Secretary at the Department for Education.

Sir Chris joined the Civil Service in 1991 as a fast streamer at the (then) Department of Education and Science. He has worked in a range of posts on education policy, including spells as Principal Private Secretary to the Secretary of State, as well as at the Department for Communities and Local Government (now Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government) as Director General for Local Government and Regeneration. He has also previously held roles in the Cabinet Office including as Director General of Public Service Reform, Head of the Economic and Domestic Secretariat and Director General in the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office.

Henry Dimbleby MBE

Henry Dimbleby is one of the UK’s leading voices on food systems, health, and sustainability. He co-founded and led the Leon restaurant chain, known for its mission to make fast food taste good and do you good. Under his leadership and that of his business partner John Vincent, Leon grew into a £100 million international business, before being sold in 2021.

As an advisor to the UK government, Dimbleby authored two landmark independent reviews that have shaped national policy. The School Food Plan (2013) introduced free school meals for children under eight and made cooking lessons mandatory for students up to age 14. His National Food Strategy (2021), praised by both the footballer Marcus Rashford and King Charles III, has significantly influenced both Conservative and Labour government policies. It was described by Prue Leith as “the best government document that’s ever come out”. He was the lead non-executive board member of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2018 to 2023.

In 2023, Henry co-authored Ravenous: How to Get Ourselves and Our Planet into Shape with his wife, Jemima Lewis. A Sunday Times bestseller, the book was celebrated by The Guardian as a “shocking and highly readable account” of how to tackle the intersecting crises of public health and climate change. In 2024, he co-authored Nourishing Britain, a political manual for improving the nation’s health based on interviews with three former prime ministers, one deputy prime minister, ten former health secretaries, and six other former and serving politicians, all of whom had first-hand experience of the vexed politics of obesity, food and health.

Dimbleby is now the co-founder and Managing Partner of Bramble Partners, which invests in food businesses which are playing an active role in fixing the system and advises companies, governments, and NGOs on how to accelerate that change.

Dimbleby also co-founded the not-for-profit Sustainable Restaurant Association in 2009 and the charity Chefs in Schools in 2018, which he chairs. He previously worked as a strategy consultant at Bain & Company; as a journalist at The Daily Telegraph; and as a commis chef at the Michelin-starred Four Seasons Inn on the Park.