Our People

Stephen is a Director of the company since its formation in April 2013.

He retired from the Police as Head of Crime Management training for Scotland and is an internationally experienced senior detective and investigator. He has 37 years public service experience in the UK and abroad.

Whilst working within Scotland he led and managed a multi agency Alcohol and Drug Action Team which won 2 Cosla Awards in the field of health improvement. Stephen is a proven and effective developer and deliverer of training in a variety of subjects tailored to local needs and an acknowledged effective advisor in an Islamic culture.

He is a certified EFQM assessor and business systems analyst.

Following a distinguished 30 year police career including extensive multi agency community related work Ian joined us in 2014.  He performed the role of Appropriate Adult until February 2017 when he took on the role of Service Manager.

During his police service, amongst many other diverse roles, he spent considerable time as a custody Sergeant and Inspector.
This provided him with extensive knowledge and experience in caring for a wide section of the community including those with mental health disability. These roles included assessing the need for the services of an Appropriate Adult. He is a proven and effective designer and deliverer of training at a national level.  

In 2011 Ian took on a variety of voluntary roles including working as a Director of Todhill Farm training home in Ayrshire. Todhill provides accommodation for and delivers training to adults with various forms of learning disability. 

Ian finds this work and his role as an Appropriate Adult very rewarding.

Ian has a Diploma in Training and Design and a Higher National Diploma in Chemistry.

Charles is a recently retired consultant psychiatrist, who worked for NHS Tayside and NHS Ayrshire & Arran as a substance use specialist for 30 years. During this time he was also Medical Director of a Community Care trust, Director of Mental Health Services in a Primary Care trust and Clinical Director of Addiction Services.  He served as Chair of the Addiction sub-committee of Royal College of Psychiatrists for 4 years and was on its executive for many more. He was one of the founding members of the Scottish Drug Specialists Committee. 

Most recently he was one of the authors of the government commissioned Opiate Replacement Therapy Review. Prior to this he chaired the group which produced the document Quality Alcohol Treatment and Support, the swan song of the Scottish Ministerial Advisory Group on Alcohol Problems on which he sat for 12 years.   

He was a member of the Scottish Drug Strategy Delivery Commission from its beginning in 2009 until its termination in 2015, as well as sitting on a variety of Scottish and UK government committees. He has sat on local ADATs and ADPs since their inception and, after retirement, continued to sit on the South Ayrshire Alcohol and Drug Partnership whilst chairing the Recovery Oriented System of Care sub group until 2015. This last has been instrumental in the local involvement of service users in service delivery. He was also on the executive committee of Recovery Ayr until 2015 and is passionate about placing recovery communities at the centre of local strategy and processes. 

He has always, often at length, bemoaned the disproportionately low investment in the care of those with Mental Health issues compared with other health service users.  Charles' main pleasures comes from his family, his dogs and making loud dissonances cunningly disguised as music.

Jacqui joined as an Appropriate Adult in 2014 and currently performs the role of coordinator, assessing, responding to and allocating resources to out of hours requests. 

She is a member of the National Reference Group of the Scottish Consortium for Learning Disabilities and is involved in the development of easy read publications, organisation of events and training delivery. 

She has 17 years experience of supporting children and adults with learning disabilities and mental health difficulties, working across a range of agencies, including Social Work, NHS, Housing, Benefits and Voluntary Organisations.

Jacqui has an HNC is Social Care. 

Lesley-Anne joined us as an Appropriate Adult in 2014. She now also performs the role of Coordinator assessing, responding to and allocating resources to out of hours requests.

She is a health and social care professional with 25 year’s experience who has worked within community care interacting with service users of various ages with conditions including dementia and Alzheimer's. She has also worked with people who have learning difficulties and mental health issues

Lesley-Anne has extensive experience supervising staff, managing and coordinating services.

She has an BA Open Degree in Social Care.

Helen joined us in 2014 as an Appropriate Adult.

She has a Higher Education Diploma in Adult Nursing which led to work within Orthopaedics and Trauma before moving on to a role helping individuals with Learning Disability.  Helen then returned to further education obtaining an HNC in Social Care which resulted in work helping homeless people within the North West and West end of Glasgow. During this time, she completed an SVQ in Promoting Independence, empowering individuals to reach their full potential through promoting rights, diversity, equality, social and physical wellbeing while maintaining health and safety.   She has experience in working within criminal justice.

This developed Helen’s interest in working with offenders addressing factors which may have led them into the Criminal Justice system.  A further period of academic study led to a BSc in inter-professional Practice within the Alcohol and Drugs field.

Helen is currently studying for an MSc in Social Work.

Irene became an Appropriate Adult with us in 2014.

She as worked for 10 years with Service Users in Mental Health and Learning Disability Services. Role of Administrator for processes under the Mental Health (Scotland) Act in regards to Emergency and Short Term Detentions and Compulsory Treatment Orders, Guardianships and Adult Support and Protection.
 
She is involved in the processes of re-enablement and support of Service Users who have a learning or mental difficulty to promote independent living. 

John joined us as an Appropriate Adult in 2014 having completed 34 years Police Service in both city and rural environments. 

He performed many roles, which included Instructor at the Scottish Police College, CID, OIC Community Policing and Custody Sergeant.
As a Community Policing Supervisor John was at the forefront in developing partnerships with various agencies and as a long term Custody Sergeant was responsible for the rights and care of prisoners many of whom suffered from mental health disability.

As a Detective Officer John was awarded the International Police Association Travel Scholarship for Scotland and worked with the New York City Police Department enforcing drug related crime.
During his career John was awarded the Commandants Cup for outstanding Academic Ability and has an HNC in Police Systems and Procedures (Scotland and Northern Ireland)

Lorna joined us in 2014 and performs the role of Appropriate Adult. During a 32 year police career she worked in a variety of roles. As an example when Deputy Head of Crime Management for Scotland she was responsible for the development and delivery of varied training programs in Scotland, the UK and internationally, involving the training of not only police, but Social Work and other agencies. Lorna has extensive experience within the criminal justice system including varied multi agency partnership work related to the protection of vulnerable adults and children.

Lorna has experience as a Children's Panel member in Ayrshire, which involves making legally binding decisions about the welfare of vulnerable children and young people at a children's hearing. 

She has a Certificate in Child Protection Studies from Dundee University and a Diploma of Higher Education, Training and Development from Napier University Edinburgh.

Margaret joined us as an Appropriate Adult in 2014. 

She has over 26 years’ experience in a variety of Social Care Roles. This includes service as a residential house parent, provision of intensive support for young people with difficulties, couple counseling, working with vulnerable homeless people, family support related to addiction, mental health and aspects of abuse, and latterly with the children and families response team. 

She has experience of working with the criminal justice system researching and providing reports to help ensure Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements are effective (MAPPA) and assists in providing through care to offenders on their release from Prison.
 
She is currently studying to attain a BSc in Criminology and Psychology, has a Certificate of Higher Education in Criminology and Psychology, a Certificate of Health and Social Care, an NC in Social Care, has completed Parenting Programme Trainers Training, Life Coaching Skills for Practitioners Working With Female Offenders and has an Advanced Certificate in Couple Counseling Modules ABC Plus having completed 300 Counseling Hours.

Diane joined us in 2017. During a 26-year career in the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscals Service, she performed many roles which included investigating and preparing serious criminal cases for prosecution in the Sheriff and Jury and High Court.

Diane took a special interest in supporting victims and witnesses throughout the justice process.

She was an accredited sexual crime investigator, and a High Court sitting manager.

On leaving COPFS Diane established a support service for those affected by trauma and loss. She remains involved in private investigation work and worked for the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry recording evidence from victims of historical child abuse.

In her spare time Diane is a volunteer with the National Autistic Society and enjoys working with young people on the autistic spectrum.

Gerard joined us in 2017. He has considerable experience working in Criminal Justice and Child Protection, providing representation and advice to people from diverse backgrounds and abilities, a significant number of whom had mental ill health.

Gerard has also worked as a Safeguarder to the Children's Hearing and Court Reporter in family cases, visiting families and care facilities throughout Scotland. 

More recently, Gerard has worked in Ayrshire with a well-established Third Sector provider of support and advocacy for adults and older children with learning disability and mental ill health. He has recently undergone related training with emphasis on epilepsy and autism and continues to pursue accreditation and further study in these fields.

John joined us in 2017. In a distinguished 30-year Police career he served in a variety of roles including translator, family liaison, accident investigator, events and emergencies planning and inter-agency facilitator. On retiral he briefly worked in radio broadcasting before moving to the Insurance sector specialising in mitigation for road crash victims.

Latterly, taking up a post in Local Government, John was a Facilities Coordinator, working in tandem with the Education Department. This brought him into daily contact with vulnerable adults and young people with learning and physical disability. He is well versed in the doctrines of GIRFEC and SHANARRI

He holds a Certificate in Leadership and Management from the Institute of Leadership and Management. A keen motorcyclist, he is also an Examiner, for the Institute of Advanced Motorists.

Carol has worked with the Appropriate Adult Scheme for 3 years.

She has 20+ years’ experience working with vulnerable children and adults in the community from caring responsibilities to management with third sector providers.

She currently works within a frontline social work team, care managing the needs of vulnerable adults in the community and is committed to supporting equal rights for those who are not able to express their needs and wishes as part of her daily work practice and as an Appropriate Adult out of office hours.

Carol has recently agreed to work with a fostering panel for an external agency that provides support for vulnerable adults, to ensure that those who provide support at home are recognised as ‘fit and proper’ carers.

Carol is studying towards a health and social care degree with the Open University to complement her work practice.  She holds certificates and SVQ’s of all levels in social care and management.