NCF LLP – 2nd residential 2013 brief biographies
Flick Rea
Cllr Flick Rea has been a Councillor in Camden since 1986. She was Leader of Camden's Liberal Democrat Group until May 2005 and Cabinet Member for Culture and Sport from 2006-10. She is currently Chair of the LGA Culture and Tourism Board and was formerly Vice Chair of London Councils Arts, Tourism and 2012 Forum. She is a member of the London Regional Board of the Arts Council and represents the LGA on the Youth Libraries Board.
Trained originally in the theatre, Flick has long term links with a number of Arts organisations including many years on the Boards of Hampstead Theatre and the Camden Arts Centre. She is currently Vice-Chair of the Trustees of the Charles Dickens Museum.
Paul Lankester
Paul commenced his career in local government as a ‘temporary Audit Clerk’ before developing a career in Environmental Health Services. He has worked in five district councils, mainly in the Home Counties. He has extensive experience in contracting services, both as a client/commissioner and as a contractor. He became a local authority Chief Executive in 2001.
He represented for six years firstly, the Association of District Councils and then, the Local Government Association on HELA (a national committee dealing with health and safety enforcement.). He is currently the Secretary of the Chief Executives’ Steering Group of the District Councils’ Network.
For six years Paul was a trustee of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health which included 3 years as a Non-Executive Director serving on the Boards of the trading companies of that body.
He is a past Secretary of SOLACE West Midlands Branch and is the Chairman of the Education Trust, SOLACE Foundation. He is a regular correspondent for the Municipal Journal.
Paul has a keen interest in change management and improvement in local government and is a member of the West Midlands Regional Board on Improvement and excellence. He has been extensively involved in culture change in his role as Chief Executive at Stratford District Council where, with members and staff, the Council transformed in three years from a ‘weak’ to ‘good’ authority under the Comprehensive Performance Assessment and holder of the Investors in Excellence Standard. In 2011 the Council was awarded “Most Improved Organisation” in the Midlands Excellence Awards. The Council also was awarded beacon status for its work in Digital Inclusion in March 2009.
In his leisure time he plays golf (his playing partners would say badly with some justification) and spends as much time as possible on football - coaching, playing and watching. He readily admits to being a supporter of Watford FC but, there again as he says, someone has to!
Liz Blyth
Liz Blyth is Leicester City Council’s Director of Culture and Neighbourhood Services and her responsibilities include arts, museums, libraries, community services and sports as well as partnership development and cultural strategy.
From 2002 to 2010 Liz was Leicester City Council’s Cultural Strategy Manager and from 1997 she was seconded part time as the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland champion for the Cultural Improvement Partnership East Midlands (CIPEM). In 2009 Liz became CIPEM’s director on a part time basis leading the local government improvement programme under the programme completed in 2011.
Liz has experience in the cultural sector, health and social care, international development and neighbourhood renewal. She is a qualified youth and community worker, has a MA in Management, Organisation and Change and an ILM Executive Diploma in Management. She is also a graduate of ‘Leading Learning’, the national leadership programme for culture and has authored chapters for two Open University books on inter-professional working in health and social care.
Liz loves living in Leicester and is a passionate advocate for arts and culture locally and beyond. In her spare time she enjoys travel, cooking for friends, the theatre, literature and her allotment.
Simon Baddeley
As an Hon. Lecturer at Birmingham University where he has worked since 1973, Simon Baddeley’s fascination is with working relations between politicians and managers in making government. He has taught in Australia, Sweden, Japan, and Canada. He has invented many training approaches to this sensitive subject, including the ‘owl/fox/donkey/sheep’ model (co-author Kim James), and created a film collection of interviews with politicians and managers working across political-managerial boundaries.
Outside his university work, he started the Handsworth Allotments Information Group, campaigning to save urban growing space, submitting evidence to the sub-committee on ‘The Future for Allotments’. He has written a history of his local park, co-founded Handsworth Park Association, given evidence to the Environment Sub-committee on ‘Town and Country Parks’ and featured in BBC documentaries about allotments.
Selected Publications
Baddeley, S & Martin, J (2008) ‘Negotiating the overlap’ in Local Government Managers Australia, Oct/Nov., pp.18-19
Baddeley, S (2008) ‘Political-Management Leadership’, in James, K & Collins, J (eds.)(2008) Leadership Perspectives: Knowledge into action (PalgraveMacmillan) pp.177-192
Baddeley, S (1998) ‘Constructing trust at the top of local government’, in Andrew Coulson (ed.) (1998) Trust & Contracts: Relationships in local government, health & public services (Policy Press) (4) 55-78
Baddeley, S (1997) ‘The Founding of Handsworth Park 1882-1898’ (Birmingham University)
Baddeley, S (1997) ‘Governmentality’ in Brian Loader (ed.) (1997) The Governance of Cyberspace (London: Routledge) (5) 64-96
Baddeley, S (1995) ‘Internal Polity’ Human Relations, 48 (9) pp.1073-1103
Baddeley, S & James, K (1987) ‘Owl, Fox, Donkey, Sheep: Political Skills for Managers’, Management Education & Development, 18 (1) Spring, pp. 3-19
http://www.inlogov.bham.ac.uk/staff/baddeley.shtml - top
Martyn Allison freelance consultant and formerly National Advisor for Culture and Sport with Local Government Improvement and Development Agency (LGID).
From 2005 to 2008 until the work was mainstreamed by IDeA (predecessor of LGID), Martyn headed up the cultural service improvement unit jointly funded by DCMS, Sport England, Arts Council England, MLA and English Heritage.
Prior to his appointment with IDeA in April 2005 Martyn was on secondment with Sport England part funded by ODPM to oversee the development and implementation of the TAES self assessment framework and support the wider development of the improvement agenda in the cultural sector.
Prior to this he was Assistant Chief Executive with Leicester City Council where he was responsible for corporate and performance management across the Council for over seven years.
Martyn’s early career was spent in leisure and recreation management as Deputy and Director of Leisure at Leicester City Council, Chief Recreation Officer at Scunthorpe Borough Council, and Head of Outdoor Sport at Coventry City Council.
Martyn was Chair of the ILAM Children’s play panel for many years and an advisor to the ADC.
Sue Isherwood, Director NLCF Leading Learning Programme
For the last 12 years Sue has worked in and with local government, developing cultural strategy and delivering major programmes around creative industries, arts education and rural regeneration.
From 2002 to 2007 she was Chair and Strategic Lead for the National Association of Local Government Arts Officers (nalgao) now Arts Development UK. This gives her excellent knowledge and networks across the local government field in England and Wales.
She has had a long career working mainly at national level for such organisations as The Arts Council, The British Film Institute and the Royal Photographic Society where she specialised in media, visual art and education development.
Since the mid 70’s she has taught on cultural and women’s studies and arts policy courses at a number of universities and has managed arts organisations in the literature, media and education sectors.
She is currently Chair of Arts and Health South West, Vice Chair of Voluntary Arts and a board member of Western Community Leisure, SW Forum and several small media, social interest and women’s health organisations in the South West.