I am a retired Relationship banker whose career spanned the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. I manage a House owned by the ANZ’s Sports’ and Social Club, as well as being the Deputy Chairperson for the ANZ London Pension Committee. 

I joined SWR in 2018 and became a Trustee a year later. I initially helped establish the Language Provision for our families with David Hinks, Trustee (my husband). Following the Strategic Review, I have now become Trustee for Volunteers.

I am a retired Head Teacher having completed over 30 years working in the education sector both here in the United Kingdom and in New Zealand. My specialisation was working with and supporting young people with mental health and behavioural difficulties. I am fully trained in Child Protection and Safeguarding. 

I have over the past few years volunteered with the homeless charity Crisis and over the Christmas period here in London. I joined SWR in 2017 as a language volunteer and became the Trustee with overall responsibility for the coordination of the Language Provision a year later. Since the Strategic Review this role encompasses the Path to Independence.

I qualified as an accountant in 1980 at Unilever, for whom I worked for 17 years in the UK and abroad.  I subsequently worked for Lloyds TSB, the NHS, and DEFRA and retired from the role of Head of Financial Accounting for the Department of Energy and Climate Change in 2015.  

I am also involved in several other charities including Empathy Action, Safe Passage, Future Men and Action for Happiness, working in both finance and non-finance roles.

My background is in marketing and communications, with a series of roles in the social enterprise, private and government sectors. I also worked for Oxfam in Africa for 3 years managing aid programmes in Sudan and Somaliland, and for one year in a fundraising role at Oxfam’s head office in Oxford. I have experience in leading teams and projects as an Army officer, a director and as a senior civil servant. I am also a trustee of The Lord Deedes of Aldington Charitable Trust.

I joined SWR relatively recently, initially as a language volunteer. For much of my career I have advised trustees of pension schemes around funding or when their employer is involved in a major transaction and I currently am a partner in a large consulting practice in London. 

I have previously worked on the corporate finance side of a stockbroking firm for several years and also practised for several years as a banking and finance lawyer.  

I retired in July 2023. My background is mostly as a Local Government Manager. I started my career in Housing Estate Management, moving on to Policy and Performance. In latter years I became more involved in the procurement of Major Housing and Education Projects, leading on consultation between Tenant, Schools, Contractor and LA Stakeholders. Over the past fifteen years I've been increasingly involved with Contract and Service Compliance.

I've volunteered for Quaker Social Action and as an Independent Custody Visitor. I am currently a school governor and treasurer for a community choir.

I began working in the House of Lords over 20 years ago. I am currently Deputy Head of the Legislation Office, a role which I have held for about 10 years. Prior to the Lords, I trained as a barrister and worked as a government lawyer for the Court of Appeal Criminal Division and for the Law Commission criminal law team, after which I was Assistant Secretary to the Committee on Standards in Public Life, the body which monitors ethical standards across public life in the UK.

I have previously volunteered for the Samaritans in Tunbridge Wells. I currently work full time but am planning to take partial retirement. I am looking forward to the further opportunities for volunteering that working part time will provide.

I retired from chartered accountancy at the age of 28 moving, via a masters degree, into the world of international development. For the next decade I worked with a number of international NGOs in Africa and Asia. In 1998 I joined the UK Department for International Development where I worked in Whitehall and in lower and middle-income countries in the Middle East, Africa and Asia, until retiring in 2018.

Since retiring I have kept busy as a consultant, undertaking various pro bono work, trying to improve my bridge and Italian language and, most recently, hosting Ukrainian refugees in collaboration with SWR. I am extremely excited about joining SWR as the Key Partners Trustee where I hope my background will help me to advance the goals of SWR and support the other volunteers and the refugees.

I retired in 2020 after 16 years with Save the Children. I was Save the Children's Global Education Director, Country Director first for Afghanistan and then for Pakistan, and Team Leader for the Response to the Rohingya Crisis in Bangladesh. While at Save the Children I was also deployed during the Ebola crisis to Sierra Leone. Since retiring, I deployed again, within the UN architecture, for three months to Kyiv to set up the coordination of the education aspects of the entire international response to the crisis in Ukraine.

I am currently also chair of the statutory Independent Monitoring Board of HMP Maidstone, one of three prisons in the country to house only foreign nationals.