Numbers restored

There's a now classical counterpoint to the thrash metal and punk tendencies of John Whittingdale at the DCMS. Aline Nassif is his new special adviser.  Of Lebanese Christian background, she was a music scholar at St. Paul’s Girls’ School, London and spent a year at the Royal College of Music before studying at Christ Church, Oxford, graduating with BMusic and MSt degrees in 2003.

She took up the violin at six, studying with the late Sidney Griller and then Natasha Boyarsky. During her time at university she performed the violin solo of Chausson’s Concert Op.21 with the Allegri String Quartet, received the Oxford Philomusica Orchestral Award, and appeared as soloist with the Christ Church Festival and the Oxford Philharmonia Orchestras.

After college, she turned to hackery, grafting for the Evening Standard and the Croydon Advertiser, and travel writing for the Independent. Croydon South MP Richard Ottaway hired her as a researcher in 2010 when he became Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. In 2014 she stood unsucessfully for Westminster Council, from a handy address in Marsham Street. She followed on as a Special Adviser to Justine Greening at DFID.

The interests of the local press and violin players everywhere are surely now secure in Charter Renewal.