Lyndall Stein (Chair)

Lyndall Stein is a leading authority in campaigning, income generation and communications.

She was the Executive Director of Concern UK for four years. She was responsible for launching the new UK Charity, whose HQ is based in Dublin, and developing the founding Board of Trustees.

Prior to that she was recruited to ActionAid as International Marketing Director, to lead a major change process to raise profile, develop campaigning, and create new income.

She was Interim Director of Marketing at the Terrence Higgins Trust 97-99 and Head of Fundraising from '92-'95. She was the first Fundraising Director for the Big Issue Foundation from '95-'97.

Lyndall developed the first individual fundraising program for the African National Congress in the 80's and Chaired Votes for Freedom, the initiative that raised several million for South Africa's first democratic election.

She is founder Editor of Positive Lives, a ten year photographic project showing the global human response to HIV/AIDS, an exhibition seen worldwide by over two million people worldwide - and Co Founder of HIV International, a volunteer group committed to raising support for the HIV crisis in the developing world.

Margaret Donnelly

Margaret worked as Sheila's Personal Assistant for 17 years; first at Shelter from 1987 to 1994 and subsequently at Which? until Sheila's death in January 2004. She remains at the consumer watchdog as Personal Assistant to the Chief Executive. Margaret has a degree in History from the University of Warwick, where she specialised in the Renaissance and spent time studying in Venice.

Matthew Downie

Matthew joined Action for Children in June 2010 as Head of Parliamentary and Public Affairs where he is responsible for the UK-wide influencing strategy. Prior to this Matthew worked as Campaigns Manager with The National Autistic Society (NAS) where he managed a campaigns team who were awarded the Charity Times ‘Campaigns Team of the Year 2009’ for the groundbreaking Autism Bill campaign.  PR week also recognised the success of this campaign with the ‘Public Affairs Category Winner 2009’ award. Matthew has also been closely involved in the Gary McKinnon Campaign which, to date, has successfully prevented his extradition following accusations of his hacking into US security systems.  

Prior to moving into campaigning Matthew worked in finance with Shelter, RNID and NAS.  He has travelled extensively throughout South America, Africa and Eastern Europe and enjoys fitness and sport having recently completed his second marathon. Matthew joined the SMK Board in May 2010.  He is married with one daughter. 

Blake Lee-Harwood

Blake is a life-long campaigner who has worked for a wide variety of organisations dedicated to social change on a broad range of campaign issues over the past 20 years.  He has a wealth of media, communications and campaigns experience gained at Friends of the Earth, Voluntary Services Overseas, RSPB and Greenpeace UK.

Since 2007 Blake has worked as an advisor and mentor on campaign strategy and implementation with a variety of clients.   He has worked with a range of corporate clients to develop their CSR and Communications strategies and currently advises Asda/Walmart on ecological sustainability and labour standards.  Blake has also been a Climate Change consultant and advisor working with the Foreign & Commonwealth office and DfID on respective strategy and campaign development around climate change.

Blake joined the SMK Board in May 2010.

Vaughan Lindsay

Vaughan has been Chief Executive of the Dartington Hall Trust since February 2004. The Trust is committed to helping people realise inspired ideas through several strands of activity, from the arts and education to ecology, social research and commercial enterprise.

After graduating from Oxford University with a BA in Geography and obtaining an MSc in Demography from the London School of Economics, Vaughan went to work for Procter & Gamble, though moved quickly to the Kings Fund where he was sponsored through an MBA at the London Business School. His next move was to join Sheila at Shelter, spending six years as Director of Resources, before becoming Deputy Director of NCVO. Headhunted by the internationally renowned strategic management consultancy McKinsey while at NCVO, Vaughan then spent six years advising blue chip organisations on their strategy, marketing and sales. He is married with a daughter and lives in Devon.

Lucy Musgrave

Lucy is a leading practitioner on sustainable communities, social architecture and urban design.

She is the Director of Publica, a creative consultancy and community interest company specialising in research and practice in the design of public realm issues.

Previously, Lucy was the co-director of General Public Agency London-based consultancy specialising in high quality spatial strategies and the provision of meaningful community propositions.

She has also been the Director of The Architecture Foundation, a campaigning charity and cultural organization, Lucy developed programmes of action research focusing on social inclusion and the built environment.

She has pioneered new thinking, methodologies and evaluation for community planning and regeneration. In 1996 she staged a series of influential "public forums" on the future of London that attracted over 15,000 people and effected government policy.

Lucy has produced the publication Creative Spaces: a toolkit for participatory urban design and two UK government-sponsored directories on the best emerging architects in Britain. She is co-author of the Thames & Hudson-publication Design & Landscape for People: New Approaches to Renewal.

She has been involved in a number of advisory and board roles, including the UK government's Urban Sounding Board, the Greater London Authority's Public Realm Advisory Group and the Mies van der Rohe European Prize for Public Space.

John Rudkin

John is a Chartered Accountant and was appointed as Treasurer on the Sheila McKechnie Foundation Board of Trustees in October 2008. John knew Sheila from his work with Which? where he currently works as an Internal Auditor. He is a Director of Tradewind Heights RTM Limited.

Nigel Saxby-Soffe

Nigel has had a distinguished career in finance spanning both the corporate and NGO sector. He qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG before joining J. Henry Schroder & Co., where he was an Investment Banking Director. In 1994 Nigel joined ActionAid as Director of Finance where he oversaw the development of the ActionAid International federation of international development organisations operating in 50 countries and was responsible for ensuring its financial integrity and improving its financial performance and accountability.

Nigel was a Non-Executive Director of the Sussex Ambulance Service NHS Trust from 1994 – 2004.

Nigel is married with two children and lives in Sussex.  He joined the SMK Board in May 2010 and is a member of the SMK Finance Committee.

Mike Schwarz

Mike is a Partner in Criminal law with Bindmans where he defends those facing the most serious and complex offences - such as murder, fraud, money laundering and multi-party criminal proceedings. He is experienced in cases with an international or European element - including extradition and fair trial.

He acts for political activists and campaigners on issues such as the environment, animal rights, peace/disarmament, race and social justice.  He is particularly concerned with citizens’ freedom of expression and freedom of assembly under articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention of Human Rights.  

Mike is joint author of 'The Law of Public Order and Protest' (Oxford University Press, March 2010). He regularly appears in the specialist and mainstream broadcast media.

Mike has been a solicitor since 1992 and in 2011 won the Solicitor of the Year - Private Practice award. He has a law degree from Oxford University and a post-graduate Diploma of Advanced European Legal Studies, from College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium. He joined the SMK Board in September 2011.

John Wilkes

John Wilkes has a strong commitment to equality and human rights with long experience in the voluntary, statutory and private sectors in Scotland and the UK. He has been an active campaigner on LGBT issues for over twenty years.

Since 2008 he has worked as chief executive of Scottish Refugee Council.

With a degree in chemistry he worked in engineering and marketing in the electronics industry for over twelve years. His work as an active volunteer on lesbian and gay issues led him to a career in the voluntary sector as chief executive of Scotland’s leading HIV and AIDS organisation before joining Carers UK as Scotland Director. From 2001 he was Director of the Equal Opportunities Commission Scotland until the commission’s remit was taken over by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

He has always been active in volunteering and other work. He has worked with many organisations including serving as the chair of the Glasgow Lesbian and Gay Centre, founding member of the Glasgay! Arts festival and the chair of the Glasgow Council for Voluntary Sector.

From 1999 to 2003 he was a member of the Communities Fund (now the Big Lottery) Scotland committee and from 2004 to 2008 was a member of the board of Stonewall, the UK’s leading gay and lesbian advocacy and campaigning organisation.  He is currently a member of the board of the Equality Network and chair of the White Ribbon Scotland campaign.

Alastair Wilson

Alastair Wilson, Chief Executive of the School of Social Entrepreneurs (SSE). SSE's core service is a year-long 'action learning' based programme consisting of a combination of expert and witness sessions, project visits, individual tutoring and mentoring. After working for six years as a Marketing Manager for ICL/Fujitsu computers, Alastair spent a year as a student of the School for Social Entrepreneurs. This led him to start up Homeless Direct, a capacity building project which supports local providers of emergency care for homeless people in recruiting donors and volunteers. After three years of running Homeless Direct, he returned to the SSE initially as Development Director and later as CEO. Alastair is also a trustee of UnLtd (Foundation for Social Entrepreneurs), The London Funders Group and the Social Enterprise Coalition.