Governance and Structure
Blue Shield UK is managed by five Trustees who guide the organisation, including the Chair and the Treasurer, and supported by a Secretary.
The membership includes national representatives of the four founding organisations, ICA, ICOM, ICOMOS, IFLA, together with other national cultural organisations, lawyers, representatives of ministries, members of the British Army, and academics.
Under its 2023 statutes, the UK National Committee of the Blue Shield is a charitable company. We are currently registering our statutes with the UK Charities Commission. The statutes set out the mission, role, and responsibilities of Blue Shield UK.
The membership includes national representatives of the four founding organisations, ICA, ICOM, ICOMOS, IFLA, together with other national cultural organisations, lawyers, representatives of ministries, members of the British Army, and academics.
Under its 2023 statutes, the UK National Committee of the Blue Shield is a charitable company. We are currently registering our statutes with the UK Charities Commission. The statutes set out the mission, role, and responsibilities of Blue Shield UK.
Meet The Trustees
FIONNUALA Rogers
Chair and trusteeBio
Fionnuala Rogers is an international art and cultural property lawyer and Chair of the UK Committee for the Blue Shield. She is also a member of the Blue Shield International Illegal Trade Working Group and also represented Blue Shield on the UK Government Illegal Trade Working Group, hosted by DCMS. Fionnuala has been a member of UK Blue Shield since 2015, and Chair since 2020. Fionnuala is also founder and director of Canvas Art Law, Trustee of the Arab British Centre, and founding Trustee of CHARD (Cultural Heritage at Risk Database). With over 12 years of experience in art, cultural property, and heritage, Fionnuala is a prominent advisor in international regulation and policy on heritage issues, assisting governments and policymakers in drafting and amending international legislation related to cultural property protection and illicit trafficking. She encourages compliance with international best practices and fosters cultural collaborations between state parties. Fionnuala has extensive experience in the Middle East region. |
SUZANNA JOY
TrusteeBio
Suzanna Joy has been a member of UK Blue Shield since 2012, and Trustee since 2020. She is a cultural heritage consultant with nearly 30 years’ experience, having been based in Australia then the UK and has worked in many places around the world. For the past 17 years Suzanna worked for the engineering company Arup, building and leading their Cultural Heritage and Historic Environment team. She worked on a number of natural disaster projects for Arup which included cultural heritage assessment and reconstruction masterplanning. Suzanna is an Army Reservist and is now an Officer with the UK Military’s Cultural Property Protection Unit where she works within the UK to support UK forces and overseas with other nations' civil and military CP specialists. Suzanna started her career working with Indigenous traditional owners in Australia and has an interest in the value of intangible and local community cultural heritage. |
Tom Pinfold
TrustEEBIO
Tom Pinfold is currently working for Sotera Heritage as their Head of Development, and serving as a Royal Naval Reserve officer specialising in culture and strategic communications. Sotera Heritage is a not-for-profit organisation that has created a system using AI technology that allows people to record objects at risk during crisis, and digitally track them should they be looted and appear in the market. Before Sotera Tom read Archaeology at UCL (1998-2001), before working as a rare books archivist, and a field archaeologist in the UK. He also appeared in two hit BBC history programmes as an experimental archaeologist and TV presenter, and subsequently he worked as a Royal Navy officer in the UK and overseas. He has extensively volunteered in the military museum sector in London and Chester, the conservation department of the Society of Antiquaries in London, and been with Blue Shield UK since 2019. He has Masters Degrees in Terrorism, Security and Society from KCL (2010), and Military History from the University of Chester (2012), and is currently studying for a PhD in Art and Antiquities Crime, focused on the Mediterranean region, at Staffordshire University. |
James Ratcliffe
TrusteeBio
James Ratcliffe has been a member of UK Blue Shield since 2015, and Trustee since 2020. James is also a founding Trustee of CHARD (Cultural Heritage at Risk Database). More recently James has also been appointed as a member of the British Museum’s expert task force working on the recovery of pieces stolen from the museum. For the last ten years James has filled the role of General Counsel at the Art Loss Register, and leads the recovery team there. As such he spends much of his time working to recover stolen and looted cultural property, representing a range of nation states, individuals, museums and more. He has also advised on more strategic approaches to the protection and recovery in general. James originally trained as a landscape archaeologist, working over a number of field seasons in Iran, and subsequently the development of landscape parks and gardens in England, giving him a particular interest in cultural landscapes. |
Peter Stone
TrusteeBio
President, The Blue Shield. Trustee, UK Committee of the Blue Shield Peter Stone is the UNESCO Chair in Cultural Property Protection & Peace at Newcastle University (UK). He was previously Head of the School of Arts and Cultures and Professor of Heritage Studies in the International Centre for Cultural and Heritage Studies at Newcastle. Before joining the University in 1997, he had worked for English Heritage, as a field archaeologist, and history teacher. Since 2003 Peter’s work has focussed on the protection of heritage in armed conflict and following disasters. Peter argues that tangible and intangible heritage provides a sense of place, belonging, and identity supporting individual and communal dignity and wellbeing. Such heritage reflects our differences but, of greater importance, it celebrates and emphasises our similarities. Peter has written extensively on this topic including co-editing, with Joanne Farchakh Bajjaly, The Destruction of Cultural Heritage in Iraq (2008) and editing Cultural Heritage, Ethics, and the Military (2011). Peter’s article ‘The 4 Tier approach’ in the British Army Review was instrumental in the establishment of the Cultural Property Protection Unit in UK forces. |
Olivia Whitting
SecretaryBIO
Olivia Whitting is a Cultural Property Specialist at The Art Loss Register in London. The Art Loss Register provides due diligence for the art market and Olivia looks after the UK and US auction house clients, as well as heads up the research team for cultural heritage. Olivia has been a member of UK Blue Shield since 2023. Having received her MA in History of Art and Architecture of the Islamic Middle East and Turkish, Olivia began working at the ALR. Provenance research into objects of cultural importance has been a focus of her work, and she plays an active role in CHARD (Cultural Heritage at Risk Database), which seeks to record items of cultural significance which may be at risk of looting, destruction, and theft. |
MEMBERS and WORKING GROUPS
Blue Shield UK's working groups are comprised of members across various sectors with many areas of expertise.
Unknown remains of a 19thC. sailing ship hull, Aberlady Bay. Changing weather patterns have resulted in the gradual exposure of the hull and accelerated decay of the timbers. © R. Curtis
CLIMATE CHANGEThe WG is identifying climate threats in the UK affecting cultural heritage, aiming to bridge the current gap between cultural heritage organisations and climate change agencies, in the context of both tangible and intangible cultural heritage; both face risks from changes to the environment.
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BSUK support to British Army Cultural Property Protection Course
© BSUK
Conflict and Military ActivityThe WG brings together civilian heritage management professionals and military experience to bridge the gap between culture and defence. It is committed to supporting UK Government to fully implement the 1954 Hague Convention and its two Protocols in safeguarding cultural property.
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Flooding on the River Ouse, York, 27 April 2012. Hayley Green, Geograph Britain and Ireland via Wikimedia Commons
EMERGENCY PLANNNG & RESPONSEThis WG brings together leading experience to offer a cross-sector overview and ‘think tank’ capability. The group provides accessible guidance and advice relevant to the full spectrum of conflict - from unrest, to terrorism, to war, and climate-related risks such as severe weather events and wildfires.
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Etruscan “lar” statuette (household god), stolen from the Sienna Archaeological Museum in 1988. In 2018, it appeared for sale at a UK auction house, when it was matched to the lost one by the ALR. © Art Loss Register
ILLICIT TRAFFICKINGThe WG raises awareness of the impact of illicit trafficking of cultural property in the UK, maintains a network of experts, provides information and advice, comments on proposed government actions, and liaises between countries from whom objects are stolen and the UK market if these objects appear.
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UNESCO training for incoming global facilitators of the 2003 Intangible Cultural Heritage Convention (Europe and North America) held in Albania, to support safeguarding efforts, October 2023. © C. Joy.
INTANGIBLE CULTURAL HERITAGEThe WG explores how to ensure that intangible cultural heritage (ICH) is engaged and safeguarded in an emergency. In line with the 2003 ICH Convention, the WG promotes a community-based approach in identifying how their living heritage may be at risk and the measures needed to safeguard it.
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Propeller from HMS Hampshire. This cruiser sank off the Orkney coast in 1915 after contact with a mine. The wreck was looted in the 2000’s and arrests were made. The starboard propeller is now at the Lyness Museum, Hoy. © Roger Curtis
UNDERWATER HERITAGEThe WG is focused on the impact of natural disasters and human conflict on underwater cultural heritage, both in the UK and internationally. The WG establishes relations between underwater heritage practitioners, the military and other institutions with an interest on this heritage.
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