Trevor Phillips (chair)
Baroness Margaret Prosser of Battersea OBE (deputy chair)
Dr Nicola Brewer (chief executive officer)
Kay Allen
Baroness Jane Campbell DBE
Kay Carberry
Jeannie Drake CBE
Baroness Sally Greengross OBE
Professor Kay Hampton
Francesca Klug
Sir Bert Massie CBE
Ziauddin Sardar
Ben Summerskill
Dr Neil Wooding
Morag Alexander
Maeve Sherlock OBE
Joel Edwards
Trevor Phillips (chair)
On 8 September 2006, Trevor Phillips was announced as chair of the new Equality and Human Rights Commission, which took over the work of Britain's three existing equality commissions from 1 October 2007.
Trevor was appointed chair of the CRE on 1 March 2003.
Born in London in 1953, Trevor attended secondary school in Georgetown, Guyana, and then studied chemistry at Imperial College London. Between 1978 and 1980, he was president of the National Union of Students. He then went into broadcasting, becoming head of current affairs at LWT in 1992. Trevor received awards from the Royal Television Society in 1988, 1993 and 1998.
He was elected as a member of the Greater London Authority in May 2000, and became chair of the Assembly later that month.
Trevor is a director of Pepper Productions, founded in 1995, and was the executive producer on Windrush (which won the Royal Television Society documentary series of the year award in 1998), Britain's Slave Trade, Second Chance and When Black Became Beautiful. He is a vice president of the Royal Television Society.
At present, he is a board member of the Almeida Theatre in Islington, Aldeburgh Productions and the Bernie Grant Centre in Tottenham. He is a patron of the Sickle Cell Society. Between 1993 and 1998, Trevor was chair of the Runnymede Trust.
In addition to many newspaper articles and comment pieces, Trevor has co-written Windrush: The Irresistible Rise of Multiracial Britain (with Mike Phillips), published in 1998, and Britain's Slave Trade (with S.I. Martin) published the following year.
Baroness Margaret Prosser of Battersea OBE (deputy chair)
On 5 December 2006, Margaret Prosser was announced as deputy chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Previously Deputy Secretary General of the Transport & General Workers Union. Margaret was President of the TUC, an Equal Opportunities Commissioner and active International Trade Unionist, chairing the World Women's Committee of the International Chemical & Energy Workers' Union.
After retiring from the TGWU Margaret was appointed chair of the Women's National Commission, a post she held for 4 years before resigning to take up her position with the EHRC.
In 2004 Margaret was asked by the PM to chair the Women and Work Commission, looking at the continuing reasons for the gender pay and opportunities gap. The WWC reported in 2006 and Margaret continues to work with TU's, the business lobby and NGO's to promote its recommendations.
Margaret became a member of the House of Lords in July, and in November of that year she was appointed as a non-executive director of the Royal Mail.
Dr Nicola Brewer (chief executive officer)
Dr Nicola Brewer was appointed the Equality and Human Rights Commission's first chief executive in December 2006. She took up her appointment on 5 March 2007.
Prior to joining the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Nicola was director general for Europe at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, where she was responsible for delivering one of the UK's 10 international strategic priorities: 'an effective and globally competitive EU in a secure neighbourhood'. She led the FCO's contribution to the UK's 2005 Presidency of the EU, and advises the foreign secretary and minister for Europe on EU and other European policy issues. She sits on the FCO Board.
Before that, Nicola was director general for regional programmes at the Department for International Development (DfID), supervising the UK's overseas bilateral aid programmes, and was also a DfID board member.
Nicola has worked overseas in India, France and Mexico. She joined the FCO in 1983, with degrees in English and linguistics from the University of Leeds. She was awarded the CMG in 2002. She is married and has two children.
Kay Allen
On 5 December 2006, Kay Allen was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Recognised as one of the leading diversity specialists in the UK, Kay is MCIPD qualified with over 16 years' direct experience in diversity management.
In 1992, she became the HR Director for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. Working in this role, Kay became aware of the need to understand diversity in relation to customer profile and business development and introduced one of the first diversity programmes in the arts. From this, she developed a specialised role in corporate diversity management and was invited to head B&Q's diversity team in 1995, where she was responsible for developing and implementing its award-winning diversity strategy.
In January 2000, Kay was appointed as a commissioner of the Disability Rights Commission.
In 2001, she joined the Grass Roots Group as a diversity specialist and has been involved in a variety of programmes, including work for the British Army and several public sector organisations.
In her most recent appointment, Kay joined the Royal Mail as group head of social policy and inclusion. Her previous role was in the public affairs team at BSkyB, where she was implementing a diversity strategy. She is looking at a range of issues, including portrayal of disability, employing disabled people, and access to services.
Baroness Jane Campbell of Surbiton DBE
On 5 December 2006, Baroness Jane Campbell was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Jane is an independent health and social care policy adviser. She is chair of the Office for Disability Issues (ODI) Independent Living Review Expert Panel, and has been a commissioner of the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) since its inception in 2000. She is a member of the editorial board of the British Journal of Social Work (BJSW) and trustee of the National Centre for Independent Living. Jane recently stepped down as chair of the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), an independent, government-funded organisation dedicated to improving the quality of social care across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. She co-founded, and for a time directed, the National Centre for Independent Living (NCIL). As chairperson of the British Council of Disabled People (BCODP) from 1991-95, she saw the organisation through some of its most pioneering work in the fields of independent living, civil rights, peer counselling and equal opportunities.
Jane has a long history of parliamentary lobbying for improved civil and human rights for a range of excluded communities, by encouraging all disabled people, whatever their diagnosis, from all sectors of society to take control of their lives and influence political and social change. This work became the basis for a book, Disability Politics (Routledge 1996), co-authored with Professor Michael Oliver. Jane has been recognised for her work twice in the Queen's birthday honours (in 2000 and again in 2006) and is the recipient of two honorary doctorate degrees.
Kay Carberry
On 5 December 2006, Kay Carberry was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Kay was appointed assistant general secretary of the TUC in January 2003, having previously been the first head of the TUC's equal rights department, set up in 1988. As head of the new department, she established new TUC equality structures, including new specialist committees and
conferences focused on issues relating to disability and sexual orientation, to supplement longer-established structures representing the interests of women and black workers. These TUC equality bodies have led the TUC's support for trade unions in their work to counter discrimination, promote equality and protect the interests of women workers and disadvantaged minorities.
As a representative of the TUC, Kay has been involved in public policy development across a range of areas and has served on a number of government advisory bodies on equality, education, training and employment. In recent years, this has included membership of groups focusing on age diversity, work-life balance, parental support and migration. She has been a commissioner of the Equal Opportunities Commission since 1999 and was a member of the Women and Work Commission, which reported to the prime minister in February 2006 with recommendations aiming to close the gender pay gap within a generation.
She is a trustee of One Parent Families, the People's History Museum, the Work Foundation and a member of the Franco-British Council.
Jeannie Drake CBE
Jeannie Drake CBE is deputy general secretary of the Communication Workers' Union. She is a member of the Employment Appeal Tribunal, and sits on the boards of the Sector Skills Development Agency and the Pension Protection Fund. She also sits on the TUC General Council and its executive committee.
Jeannie is also responsible for transition issues relating to the former Equal Opportunities Commission on the Equality and Human Rights Commission board.
Baroness Greengross OBE
On 5 December 2006, Baroness Sally Greengross was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Sally is chief executive of the International Longevity Centre UK. She also co-chairs the Alliance for Health and the Future.
Sally has been a crossbench (independent) member of the House of Lords since 2000. She is a member of the Lords Social and Consumer Affairs sub-committee G, and chairs two all-party parliamentary groups: corporate social responsibility and the group for grandparents and extended kin.
She is chair of the Experience Corps, and also chair of UCL's advisory group for the English longitudinal study on ageing. She is patron of Beginnings, an initiative to encourage the employment of people with disabilities, and is a board member of HelpAge International, among many other charity interests. She is a trustee of the Resolution Foundation, president of the Pensions Policy Institute and honorary vice president of the Royal Society for the Promotion of Health.
Sally was director general of Age Concern England from 1987 until 2000, and is now their vice president. Until 2000, she was also joint chair of the Age Concern Institute of Gerontology at Kings College London, and secretary general of Eurolink Age. At Age Concern, she established many innovative programmes and was also responsible for building Age Concern Enterprises into a multi-million pound business.
Sally holds honorary doctorates from seven UK universities.
Professor Kay Hampton
Professor Kay Hampton became chair of the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) on 1 December 2006. Previously, Kay had served the CRE as deputy chair and commissioner for Scotland.
Kay is currently a lecturer in criminology at Glasgow Caledonian University. As a former research fellow and director of the Scottish Ethnic Minorities Research Unit between 1995 and 2000, she researched and published widely on racism, ethnicity and discrimination. Kay has also been employed by the University of Durban-Westville, South Africa (1978-1989), and the strategic planning department of Durban City Council (1990-1993).
Kay was closely associated with the voluntary sector in South Africa. Since her arrival in Scotland in 1994, she has served on several management committees, trusts and boards working in the field of inequality and disadvantage, including the Community Fund (for whom she was board member and chair between 1998 and 2003) and the Wellcome Trust Society Awards (2001-2003). She is a trustee of the Scottish Refugee Council.
Kay is also responsible for transition issues related to the CRE on the Equality and Human Rights Commission board.
Francesca Klug
On 5 December 2006, Francesca Klug was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Francesca Klug is a professorial research fellow at the Centre for the Study of Human Rights at the London School of Economics, where she directs the Human Rights Futures project. She was a member of the government's Commission for Equality and Human Rights Steering Group and was an independent academic advisor on the Equality Bill. She has been a specialist advisor to the Joint Committee on Human Rights and is a member of the Equality Review Reference Group.
Francesca was formally a senior research fellow at King's College Law School, where she worked on the model for incorporating the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law as reflected in the Human Rights Act. She was a member of the Home Office's Human Rights Task and is a former director of the Civil Liberties Trust. She was awarded an OBE for services to human rights and civil justice in the 2002 new year's honours list.
Francesca has been a campaigner for equality and human rights for 25 years. Her first job was at the Anti-Apartheid Movement and she worked for four years as a research officer at the Runnymede Trust.
Francesca is the author of Values for a Godless Age, published by Penguin in October 2000. She is currently working on its sequel, to be published by Routledge in 2008. She writes regularly for legal and political journals and the national press and is a frequent broadcaster.
Sir Bert Massie CBE
Sir Bert Massie was chair of the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) until its closure at the end of September 2007. He is a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission and a trustee of several voluntary organisations including the Institute of Employment Studies, the Habinteg Housing Association, and Motability.
During the last 30 years, he has been involved with a large number of disability organisations. He has also served on a number of government advisory committees concerned with disability. These include the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee and the National Advisory Committee on the Employment of Disabled People. He was deputy chair of the National Disability Council and a member of the Disability Rights Task Force.
In 1978, he joined the Royal Association for Disability and Rehabilitation and became its Director in 1990. He remained there until the end of 1999, when he became chair of the DRC in January 2000 (he was appointed in October 1999). He has authored or co-authored a number of books and booklets dealing with disability issues. He received a knighthood in the New Year Honours for recognition of his work for disabled people.
Bert is also responsible for transition issues relating to the DRC on the Equality and Human Rights Commission board.
Ziauddin Sardar
On 5 December 2006, Ziauddin Sardar was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Ziauddin is a writer, broadcaster and academic. He has also written extensively about issues of human rights, equality and community. He has also previously acted as an advisor on equality, development and constitutional matters to a international organisations and numerous national governments.
Ben Summerskill
On 5 December 2006, Ben Summerskill was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Ben was appointed chief executive of Stonewall in March 2003.
He successfully led parliamentary campaigns for the introduction of civil partnership and pioneering new 'goods and services' protections for gay people to be introduced in early 2007.
At Stonewall, he has led significant organisational growth in the last three years, during which membership of Stonewall's Diversity Champions good practice programme for major employers rose from 35 members to 250. Organisations now engaged in the programme - between them employing almost four million people -range from IBM, Manchester City Football Club and Barclays in the private sector to the Royal Navy in the public sector.
In 2005, Stonewall launched an Education for All programme, supported by a coalition of 70 organisations, to tackle homophobia in schools. Until 2003, Ben had spent 12 years as a journalist and was previously assistant editor of the Observer. Prior to that, he was operations director of a publicly-quoted restaurant and hotel company.
Since 2004, he has been a member of the steering group appointed by the secretary of state to support the creation of the Equality and Human Rights Commission. He is also an adviser to the London Development Agency and the London Equalities Commission.
Dr Neil Wooding
On 5 December 2006, Neil Wooding was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Neil has spent much of his career working with organisations across the UK to promote equality and human rights.
He was the first equality adviser to be appointed in Wales and during the course of his career successfully established the NHS Centre for Equality and Human Rights. He was the Wales commissioner for the Equal Opportunities Commission until its closure on 30 September 2007. He is co-chair of Stonewall Cymru, a trustee of the National Aids Trust and a non-executive director of South East Wales Race Equality Council.
He is also the director of Public Service Management Wales, an organisation set up by the Welsh Assembly Government and public service organisations to build leadership and managerial capacity. Neil is a fellow of the National Centre for Public Policy and a respected authority on equality and human rights. He lives with his partner in south east Wales and co-parents two children.
Morag Alexander
On 29 March 2007, Morag Alexander was announced as a commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Morag was appointed the first convener (chair) of the Scottish Social Services Council in 2001. She was also director of the Equal Opportunities Commission, Scotland from 1992 to 2001; chair of the Early Years Advisory Group of Children in Scotland from 1995 to 2003; and a trustee of Turning Point Scotland from 1998 to 2006. Morag is also a member of the Court of Scotland's Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.
Maeve Sherlock OBE
Maeve Sherlock is currently at Durham University doing research for her doctorate on the subject of the interface between Faith and the State in modern Britain. Until October 2006, Maeve was Chief Executive of the Refugee Council, the largest charity working with refugees and asylum-seekers. Before that, Maeve spent three years as a member of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Treasury, advising the Chancellor and Treasury ministers on a portfolio of issues including child poverty, labour markets and the Third Sector. Before moving to the Treasury, Maeve was chief executive of the charity One Parent Families and, prior to that, director of UKCOSA, a charity focusing on overseas students and international education. She is a former President of the National Union of Students.
During the 2007 Spending Review, Maeve chaired an Advisory Panel advising ministers on the future role of the Third Sector in economic and social regeneration. She is a member of the Carnegie Commission of Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society and a judge for The Charity Awards.
Joel Edwards
Joel Edwards has served on a number of faith, government and public agency advisory groups and is a regular broadcaster for UK and international media. He is the current General Director of the Evangelical Alliance and is Chair of Micah Challenge International and the Churches Media Council. He was a probation officer for 14 years with the Inner London Probation Service before his appointment as the General Secretary for the African and Caribbean Evangelical Alliance in 1988. Joel is an honorary Canon of St Paul’s Cathedral and has an honorary doctorate from the University of St Andrews.