Chris Anderson is a professionally qualified social worker and manager. She has worked in children’s services and residential work for over 26 years.

Chris has developed an interest in behaviour management and working with children who have challenging and complex needs.
She is currently the Chair of a fostering panel and is involved in training foster carers and others who work in caring for children.

In addition, Chris is currently working as a practice assessor supporting students undertaking their degree in social work.

Gillian is a barrister of eleven years call who has worked as a family law practitioner and as an in-house lawyer to two local authorities. As a practitioner in public and private family work and in immigration law, she has appeared at all levels of Court up to the Court of Appeal.

Gillian was for three years instructed by the Home Office to represent the Immigration and Nationality Department (IND) in immigration and asylum appeals and to advise caseworkers. She also designed and delivered human rights related training to IND and the Immigration Service during the same period.

Lori is a registered social worker who qualified in 1994 with a BSW. She has practiced in Canada, the US, and the UK.

Lori has a PG Dip in Child Studies and is currently undertaking her MA in Advanced Social Work (Practice Education and Training). Her extensive practice has included safeguarding, adolescent sexual offending, child and adolescent mental health, and early intervention with families.

As an organisational development consultant Lori is experienced in coaching/mentoring new social workers and first time Managers and in leadership development.

In this role she has developed a specialism in the psychological impact of front line social work, and offers a number of courses and seminars in the areas of compassion fatigue and secondary trauma.

Cliff is a dual diagnosis specialist and Approved Mental Health Professional. He holds a BA (Hons) in Approved Social Work Practice and Masters with distinction in Dual Diagnosis. Alongside training he also has a part time job for NHS South of England as the Offender Mental Health Development Manager.

Cliff has been working in the fields of mental health, substance misuse and criminal justice as a qualified practitioner since 1999. Cliff has a keen interest in relevant primary legislation and risk management alongside his clinical specialities.

Mary is a qualified social worker of seventeen years standing and is currently the Development Manager for a Local Safeguarding Children Board in London. She has since 2002 combined her work for statutory bodies with consultancy, research and independent training.

Mary has contributed to the development of child protection practice both locally and nationally and was a contributor to Phase Two of the Victoria Climbie Enquiry.

As part of her recent work, Mary has been involved in the development of a safeguarding children training framework for London and national standards for training in child protection.

Lesley Newth-West qualified as a social worker in 1988 and since 2000 has specialised in adoption.

Since September 2010 she has held the post of Team Manager for a countywide Adoption Support Service. Her team works with adopted children, carries out assessments of adopters’ support needs and offers ongoing advice and support to adopters.

Lesley’s work also encompasses work with adopted adults, and providing support to birth relatives.

The team also provides services to Special Guardians post-Order as well as co-ordinating and supporting contact services for children subject to Adoption and Special Guardianship Orders.

Tom is a registered social worker and a qualified trainer who has specialised in the field of child protection since 1991. He has written child protection procedures, training strategies and training packages for a number of local authorities and has been presenting training events since 1995.

Tom is co-author of London Safeguarding Children Board’s basic safeguarding induction training pack and ‘Competence Still Matters - a multi-agency safeguarding children training framework for London’.

He has recently played a significant role in devising a range of training packages for volunteers during the 2012 London Olympics, to be rolled out through City Operations and the London Ambassadors Volunteers Programme.

Peter is a teacher, trainer and facilitator with more than thirty years experience in the field. He was instrumental in setting up one of the first Behaviour Support Services outside London and is committed to working in a research based and reflective way.

Peter is now applying these skills with foster care workers where his interests lie in creating a professional development structure for the carers. He is particularly interested in the issues which are faced by men in care work.

Helen co-ordinates and delivers Achieving Best Evidence (ABE) training for Drive Network.

Helen has many years of practical experience in interviewing both children and vulnerable adults and is an accredited assessor and trainer in ABE for the Police Service.

Janette is a qualified social worker with over 20 years experience in the field as a practitioner and manager. Janette’s practice has extended across work with learning disability and adult mental health, where she was an early champion of the social model of disability.

For the past fifteen years Janette has worked in statutory children’s social work, and for the past five years has developed and managed Family Group Conference services for a London borough.

In this key role she continues to promote the values of empowering individuals and families, and of partnership between families and statutory services.