Sir John Flasby Lawrance Whittingdale OBE (born 16 October 1959) is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Maldon (and its predecessors) since 1992 and Shadow Minister for Health and Social Care since July 2024.

He then served as Special Adviser to three successive Secretaries of State for Trade and Industry, Norman Tebbit (1984–1985); Leon Brittan (1985–1986), and Paul Channon (1986–1987).

[11][12] After the election, he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to Eric Forth, Minister of State for Education and Employment, but resigned after voting against the Government for an amendment that would have allowed media publishers with more than a 20% share of the national press market to buy an ITV company.

[15] At the 2001 general election, Whittingdale was re-elected as MP for Maldon and East Chelmsford with an increased vote share of 49.2% and a decreased majority of 8,462.

[25] Following the referendum, he was one of several Conservative MPs who signed a letter to Prime Minister Theresa May urging that the UK withdraw from both the European single market and the Customs Union.

He was alleged to have warned members of the committee to consider not compelling former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks to testify due to the potential risk that their personal lives would be investigated in revenge, but has strongly denied the accusation.

[31] With just one out of three of News International's senior executives agreeing to appear before the committee session on 19 July, Whittingdale took the rarely used step of issuing a summons to compel the Murdochs to attend.

[32] Whittingdale said Select Committees had taken such steps against individuals in the past and they had complied and continued "I hope very much that the Murdochs will respond similarly.

[34] For its successful work on the phone hacking scandal, Whittingdale accepted The Spectator's 2011 "Inquisitor of the Year" award on behalf of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee.

The hospitality was not declared in the Register of members' interests, or later when Whittingdale later spoke out in the Commons against new regulations introduced by the Labour Government.

[25] In July 2016, shortly after his dismissal, The Guardian criticised Whittingdale over his decision to turn down a request from the Daily Mirror for the release of historic documents relating to Mark Thatcher's dealings with the government of Oman in the 1980s.

[43][8] Whittingdale's half-brother is Charles Napier, former treasurer of the defunct Paedophile Information Exchange, who was most recently convicted of child sexual abuse offences in November 2014.

In a statement to the BBC's Newsnight programme, he said he had been unaware of his girlfriend's true occupation after meeting her through Match.com, and that he had ended the relationship after he had discovered it through reports that the story was being offered for publication to tabloids.