Board of Trustees
Rt. Hon Lord Freeman PC - Chairman of the Board of Trustees.
Formerly held positions as MP for Kettering, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Armed Forces, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health, Minister of State for Public Transport, Minister of State for Defence Procurement. In 1995 he entered the Cabinet as Minister for Public Service and Chancellor of the Duchy Lancaster. He was responsible for the government's privatisation programme until leaving Parliament in 1997. He was made Privy Counsellor in 1993 and Life Peer in 1997.
Michael Hatchwell - Partner, Davenport Lyons.
Michael graduated from Nottingham Trent University in 1986 and qualified as a solicitor prior to joining Davenport Lyons in September 1988. He became a partner in 1990 and is currently head of the corporate department. He is also the President of Globalaw, the international network of 87 independant law firms comprising over 4000 lawyers .
Lord Moonie.
Lewis Moonie has been Kirkcaldy's MP since 1987. In that period he's been Defence Minister as well as being an opposition spokesperson on broadcasting and the media, trade and industry and science and technology. He is a member of the Co-operative Party , ASTMS and T&G. He is also a Non-Executive Director of AEA Technologies and Mining Scotland.
Gary Lewitt - Director Service Personnel Policy Service Conditions, Ministry of Defence.
Gary Lewitt is a Ministry of Defence civil servant. He was responsible for persuading MoD Ministers to support Skill Force at its inception in 2000. He is currently programme manager of the MoD's Defence Change Programme. a major modernisation programme.
Jan Richardson - Senior Executive, Nottinghamshire Education Business Partnership.
Jan Richardson is the former Senior Executive of Nottinghamshire Education Business Partnership and has been involved with Skill Force since 2000. She is also a Justice of the Peace and on the Board of Governors for a local school.
Roy Bliss
Roy has had a career in business, mainly communications and the internet, having founded and built a number of organisations, including Demon Internet where he was MD. He currently provides consultancy services to growing businesses. He has been involved with Skill Force since 2000 and is a founding Trustee. Roy Chairs the Strategy Committee and Skill Force Training Limited.
Tony Stables CBE - Chairman of the Confederation of British Service and Ex-Service Organisations.
Former Air Vice-Marshal with the Royal Air Force and Chief Executive of the Council of Reserve Forces and Cadets Associations. Currently Chairman of the Confederation of British Service and Ex-Service Organisations.
Shelley Collins - Director, Just Resources Ltd.
Shelley, Director of Just Resources Ltd, is a consultant, trainer and facilitator in strategic diversity management, equal opportunities, leadership, management & staff development. She has a fourteen year track record of excellence in both the public- and private sectors. Shelley is a specialist in cross-cultural knowledge and service delivery issues. She has considerable experience in staff development, coaching, training needs analysis, diversity training programmes development and implementation. Her company is one of the first to offer level 4 & above courses accredited by City & Guilds.
Her clients have included The Metropolitan Police Service, The Army School of Recruiting, The Joint Equality & Diversity training Centre of the Ministry of Defence and the Tesco, Bhs, United Response - to name but a few. Most of her training and consultancy contracts have been renewed several times over the past decade.
Shelley possesses extraordinary training and facilitation skills and is a warm, approachable person with a passion for life.
Shelley is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. In the past she has been a member of the Racial Justice Task Force of the Baptist Union and chaired the Women in Arts Advisory Board for the Arts Council of Great Britain.
Maureen McCreath – Head of Finance & Business Planning for Bank of Scotland.
Maureen McCreath is currently Head of Finance & Business Planning for Bank of Scotland Business Banking ('BoSBB') area within HBoS. BoSBB specialises in banking for the SME Sector across the UK. Based in Edinburgh, Maureen is responsible for the planning, control and financial reporting of the area, which has a significant customer base and staff of c. 1,100. A career Banker, Maureen is an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Banking.
Maureen has spent her career working for Bank of Scotland, specialising in Business Banking since the early 1990's when she started managing portfolios of customers from across Scotland. In 2001 Maureen moved to be Edinburgh based and was heavily involved in the development of Bank of Scotland's direct business banking proposition which became BoSBB and the size it is today. Prior to her current position as a Director in the organisation she was covering key non sales activities including strategy and change management.
For nearly 20 years, Maureen worked as a volunteer within the Scout movement. This included many local roles to sitting on the Scottish Board and chairing working groups.
Andrew McCully, OBE.
Andrew joined the then Department of Employment in 1986 and worked in a variety of policy and operational posts, including working on European social policy and the Maastricht Treaty and reform of benefits for unemployed people. Following promotion to the Senior Civil Service in 1997 Andrew worked first as Secretary to the New Deal Task Force, responsible for advising the new Labour Government on its welfare to work measures; then took responsibility for getting the Learning and Skills Act, reforming post-16 education and training, onto the statute book. In 2000 he established the cross-Whitehall Children and Young People’s unit in, responsible for the Government’s strategy for improving outcomes for children and young people developed into Every Child Matters. As Director for School Standards in the Department for Education and Skills Andrew was responsible for improving teaching and learning in schools, especially in the core subjects of English and Maths, for school performance and assessment and for intervention with failing schools. In Oct 2007, Andrew took up his new post as the Director for Supporting Children and Young People in the Department for Children, Schools and Families, responsible for the Government’s strategy for helping more young people on the path to success.
He was awarded an OBE in the 2000 New Year’s Honours.
David Courtley.
David Courtley is a senior executive in the Global IT and Business Services industry. Following a Mathematics degee he began his career at in IT consultancy at Scicon Limited. He was head of EDS UK in the 90s and Chief Executive of Fujitsu Services from 2001-2008. David currently provides consultancy services to a number of private equity firms and IT companies.