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Coal miner’s daughter and ex-White House aide new chancellor of Durham University

Fiona Hill - Dermot Tatlow
Fiona Hill - Dermot Tatlow

A coal miner’s daughter who became a White House foreign policy adviser has been appointed chancellor of Durham University.

Dr Fiona Hill, who has worked for US presidents George W Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump, was selected on Monday to become the ceremonial head of the university in the county where she grew up.

She first came into the public eye when she testified against Mr Trump during his impeachment in 2019, accusing his Republican allies of pushing a “fictional narrative” that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 election.

Dr Hill spent her formative years in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, where her father was a former coal miner who worked as a hospital porter and her mother was a midwife. She has previously described her thirst for learning and said she would sit on the stairs at home reading encyclopaedias.

Attending an interview at Oxford University in the 1980s, posh students sniggered at her working class accent, she has recalled.

Won a scholarship

She went to St Andrews instead, where she completed a Master’s degree in Russian and Modern History.

After graduating, she won a scholarship to read Soviet Studies at Harvard and became a policy expert on Russia.

Dr Hill, who is passionate about social mobility, has previously said that in America she was only judged as being British because they "didn't know what the accent meant", while in the UK her accent was always “a point of conversation or a point of insult".

She served on the US National Intelligence Council from 2006 to 2009, and was a member of the US National Security Council under President Trump.

Dr Hill became a US citizen in 2002 and is married with one daughter. She is replacing the opera singer Sir Tom Allen, who stepped down this summer after 10 years in the role. Her term will begin next summer following a ceremony at Durham Cathedral.

'An immense privilege'

Dr Hill said: “It is an immense privilege, surprise and honour to be selected as the next chancellor of Durham University in the county where generations of my family have deep roots and where I spent my formative years.

“I am very much looking forward to becoming more involved in university life, meeting staff and students and engaging with the wider community as I carry out my duties,” she said.

Joe Docherty, chairman of Durham University Council, said: “As chancellor, Fiona will serve as a living embodiment of the transformative powers of education and research and help to inspire our university community, especially our students, to achieve extraordinary things at Durham and beyond.

“Her educational journey, pre-eminence in Russian and global affairs, and commitment to truth highlights the value and importance of higher education, learning and research in the 21st century.”