Jonathan Slater

Jonathan Slater (born 29 November 1961) is a British civil servant. Since May 2016, he has been Permanent Secretary of the Department for Education.

Slater joined Her Majesty's Civil Service in 2001 into the Cabinet Office, having worked for Islington Borough Council. After four years there, he did a stint in the Prime Minister's Delivery Unit at Number 10 in 2005, working on NHS reform and the capability review programme. In 2006, he moved to the Ministry of Justice, working in the National Offender Management Service as its Director of Performance & Improvement, and then in 2008 as Chief Executive of the Office for Criminal Justice Reform before being promoted in 2009 to be Director-General, Transformation.

In July 2011, Slater moved to the Ministry of Defence as its Director-General, Transformation and Corporate Strategy, "pinched" by his former Permanent Secretary Ursula Brennan. His position was subsequently changed to be Director-General, Head Office and Commissioning Services.

In October 2015, Slater was appointed to replace Melanie Dawes as head of the Economic and Domestic Secretariat at the Cabinet Office. Seven months later he was again promoted to be the Permanent Secretary of the Department for Education, succeeding Chris Wormald when he moved to the Department of Health.