The Committee
Seema Malhotra – Director is a management consultant by profession, with over ten years experience with leading consultancies Accenture and PriceWaterhouse Coopers. She is also a campaigner on equality issues, community activist and was the first Asian Chair of the Fabian Society. She is the founder and Director of the Fabian Women’s Network.
She graduated from Warwick University in Politics and Philosophy, with a year spent on scholarship to the USA. She has been a consultant to several government departments and local authorities on public service reform issues, including reform of the civil/criminal justice systems and public advice services. She is a former Chair, Young Fabians, and speaks widely at local societies. Seema has been a candidate in local government and London Assembly elections. She is a contributor to news and radio discussions, and is a regular writer for political magazines. She is currently working as freelance management consultant and studying for an MBA.
Johanna Baxter – Union Liason is a National Officer for Connect, the trade union for professionals in the communications industry. Johanna has also worked as a Negotiator for the Public and Commercial Service Union (PCS) and as an Organiser for the TUC. She has been the CLP Secretary for Camberwell & Peckham for the past 3 years and BLP Secretary for The Lane for the last 5 years. Johanna has previously served on the Young Fabian Executive and Scottish Labour’s Policy Forum and Conference Arrangements Committee. Johanna enjoys voluntary work and is particularly interested in constitutional, employment and welfare policy.
Laura Nelson – Head of Communications: Is a writer and campaigner and has a background in science. After gaining a doctorate in neuroscience and working as a science journalist and in public sector health communications, Laura is the first Head of Development and Communications for the Ethox Foundation, a charity that aims to improve the quality of patient care. Passionate about politics and achieving change, Laura runs an award-winning public speaking club, Camden Speakers Club [www.camdenspeakers.org.uk], which is part of the national Association of Speakers Clubs. The club provides a platform for people to practise skills of speaking in public. Laura founded an events programme with high-profile speakers, including MPs, with the aim of inspiring people and encouraging debate. Laura writes a blog [http://delilah-mj.blogspot.com], is a speaker for the charity Womankind [www.womankind.org.uk], and has written political commentary in the Guardian’s Comment is Free. Laura is also a keen fiction writer, publishing stories in literary magazines and reading at London events. She is working on her second novel.
Sarah Hutchinson – Researcher and Website is a DPhil candidate at Oxford University, where she is researching the impact of informal care on carers’ pensions decisions. For the year 2009-10 she will be on sabbatical, working as Vice-President (Graduates) for Oxford University Student Union. She is also County Councillor in Oxfordshire.
Before starting her doctorate, Sarah took an MPhil in Comparative Social Policy at Oxford, and an MSc in Political Theory at the LSE. Before starting at Oxford she was a case officer and manager at the Charity Commission, and has also interned for a number of MPs and for IPPR. Her research interests include pensions, carers, social security, gender inequality and poverty.
Ivana Bartoletti – Editor, Fabiana magazine was born in Naples, studied in Trieste, New York and London, and holds Masters degrees in Political Science and Human Rights Law (LLM). Ivana has lived in London from 2008 and works as Criminal Justice and Immigration Act Manager for NHS Protect, the organisation which leads the fight against crime and corruption in the NHS, also leading on information governance. Actively involved in the local community, she is a Hackney Labour Group Observer and also provides pro-bono advice to charities. Before relocating to London, Ivana was leader of the Italian Union of Students, Director of the women’s rights charity Anna Lindh, Head of Human Rights of the Democrats of the Left and Policy Advisor in the Romano Prodi Government.
Emma Carr – Secretary is a public affairs consultant with a wide range of private, public and third sector experience, both in consultancy and in-house. She has formerly been Vice Chair of the Young Fabians, Editor of Anticipations magazine, Managing Editor of the Labour History Group magazine and an Executive Committee Member of the Interns’ Network. Emma is an active Labour campaigner and is a Trustee of Advocacy Plus, a charity which provides support services for older people in London.
Emma studied Linguistics at the University of Central Lancashire and completed post graduate study covering healthcare planning, health economics and health funding systems at Birkbeck College, University of London.
Emma’s recent events for the Fabian Women’s Network have focused on pensions policy and the role of women in the Labour movement. Her main policy interests are health and social care, human rights and pensions and retirement funding.
Christine Megson – Mentoring Scheme Co-ordinator After graduating from Durham University, Christine Megson’s substantive career has been in Further and Higher education including roles in College marketing in Gloucestershire and Principal of Stafford College. Over the past ten years she has worked as a principal consultant in central government departments in Education, Health and the Cabinet Office and the School Food Trust, contributing to the development and delivery of new policies from Academies to healthy eating. For The Innovation Unit she led on field trial work and developing localised models in engaging parents through raising their own aspirations and co-developed a leadership programme for support staff in schools. Recently she has led on the development of the Whole Household approach in Sheffield to develop joint working and intelligence sharing among agencies to design preventative intervention services for those families at risk of multiple negative outcomes. She is an Associate for Sheffield Hallam Business School.
Christine has been part of the team designing and delivering the mentoring scheme for the Fabian Women’s Network with Seema Malhotra and is coordinating the first pilot.
Claire Leigh – Research and Mentoring Scheme is an advisor on governance and public sector reform. She was until recently based in Liberia with Tony Blair’s Africa Governance Initiative (AGI). Prior to living in West Africa Claire spent a year in Rwanda, also with AGI, where she worked as an advisor to the Rwandan President. Before joining AGI, Claire was a senior policy advisor in the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit under Gordon Brown. She has also worked for the British Foreign Office, for UNICEF in New York and as a strategy consultant at Deloitte Consulting.
Claire is a Labour Party activist and volunteer for a range of charities and organisations, including the Young Fabians (Treasurer), Tonbridge and Malling CLP (EC officer without portfolio) and the Labour Women’s Network. Claire is also co-founder and leader of Young Fabian Women, a new initiative from the Young Fabians. Claire has an MPhil in International Relations from the University of Oxford and a first class BA in History from the University of Cambridge.
Emma Burnell – Event Manager works in social housing and is Secretary and National Policy Forum Representative for the Socialist Societies. Emma spends her time championing the role of Societies like the Fabians in Labour’s policy making process. Emma has worked for the Fabian Society and previously run SERA - Labour’s Environment Campaign. She has also worked in adult education and democratic engagement. She has been a member of the Labour Party for 21 years.
Claire Hickson – Events is managing director of Trio Policy Ltd, a company specialising in policy, advocacy and communications advice. She worked for the Department for International Development (DFID) for several years before being seconded to the Commission for Africa in 2004. Following a period working in the UK Embassy in Washington DC, she left DFID to work for Saferworld and campaigned for, amongst other things, the creation of an international Arms Trade Treaty. She has been working as a independent consultant for organisations such as DFID, Amnesty International UK, the Small Foundation and Self Help Africa since early 2010 and set up Trio in 2011. She is a councillor for Chaucer ward in Southwark and a trustee for Pancreatic Cancer UK.
Jessica Asato – Events and Social Media
Henneke Sharif – Researcher
Kate Ravenscroft – Events
Kate Groucutt – Female Futures Programme
Denise Whitt – Membership and Communications
Amina Lone – Fabian Women’s Network North
Emma Burnell – Events Manager
Carolina Lindhal – Events, Research, and Membership
Alex Kemp – Research and Events
Nina Champion – Events
Christine Quigley – Young Fabian Women liaison
