Deirdre Hanlon
Our chair is Deirdre Hanlon who has over 17 years’ experience in the voluntary legal sector; specifically providing specialist legal advice, assistance and representation to people with a mental health diagnosis or disability across a wide range of civil legal issues.
Deirdre was appointed HM Legal Commissioner to the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland in 2006 serving for a period of five years.
Since 2013, Deirdre has sat as a Legal Convener to the Mental Health Tribunal for Scotland and was further appointed as Convener to the Additional Support Needs Tribunal for Scotland in 2015.
Deirdre also edits the Health and Education Chamber Tribunal Members Bulletin. Deirdre is a partner in Kirk Hanlon solicitors where she specialises in incapacity law.
Beth Anderson
Our Treasurer is Beth Anderson who has 30 years’ experience in the finance sector working in a variety of roles for charities such as Turning Point Scotland, Richmond Fellowship, Legal Services Agency and latterly Quarriers.
Beth is a Qualified Law Accountant and a member of the Society of Law Accountants Scotland.
Maria Fletcher
Maria Fletcher is Senior Lecturer in European Law and Employability officer in the School of Law at the University of Glasgow. She teaches on EU law-related courses at both under-graduate and post-graduate level and her research interests lie in the field of EU constitutional law and EU criminal Justice and migration.
She is on the Steering Group of the University of Glasgow’s Refugee Asylum and Migration Network (GRAMNet) and the Director of the Scottish Universities Legal Network on Europe (SULNE).
Annika Joy
Annika is Director of Glasgow Night Shelter for Destitute Asylum Seekers, a charity that develops and delivers accommodation for people made destitute by the UK asylum system, and for whom access to statutory homelessness services is prohibited. She is also an active voice in advocating for the policy and legislative changes that would mean the organisation is no longer required!
Her professional background is in the development of museums and galleries that actively address their institutional history and practice of exclusion and exclusivity.
Alison Locke
Alison Locke is a practicing employment lawyer and HR Manager at the University of Strathclyde.
Alison spent around 12 years as an employment lawyer working in private practice, focusing on employment litigation and general advisory work, before moving to work in the Higher Education sector in an HR role from 2016. She has a particular interest and expertise in equality and diversity, employee relations and employee engagement.
Alison has a keen interest in learning and development. In addition to considerable experience of training both clients and colleagues, she has lectured and tutored law students at the University of Strathclyde for over 15 years. This has included tutoring on the Diploma in Legal Practice Employment Law elective and lecturing on the Employment Law undergraduate, Employment & Labour Law Masters and Discrimination Masters courses.
Colin McKay
Colin is a Professor of Mental Health and Capacity Law at Edinburgh Napier University. He is on the Executive team of the current review of Scottish mental health law.
From 2014-2020 he was Chief Executive of the Mental Welfare Commission. The Commission is a statutory agency responsible for protecting the human rights of people with mental illness, learning disabilities, dementia and related conditions.
Previously Colin worked in the Scottish Government for 14 years, working on areas including mental health law, strategy and public service reform. For several years he had responsibility for civil justice policy, including legal aid and court reform. Before that he was a solicitor, and spent 10 years with ENABLE Scotland, where he led campaigning and policy work, established the ENABLE Trustee Service, and served as a Mental Welfare Commissioner for 2 years.
Ros Micklem
Ros is a coach and mentor, and was until recently a Trustee of Shelter, the housing and homelessness charity.
Previously she worked in the public sector in England and Scotland, starting as a lecturer in English and Communications in a further education college, moving to Scotland in 1997 as Principal of Cardonald College in Glasgow, and going on from there to work for four years as Scotland Director of the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
Ros has extensive governance experience, having held three Ministerial appointments on the boards of public bodies in Scotland, as well as supporting various charities as a Trustee.
Lindsey Reynolds
Lindsey Reynolds is a senior solicitor at the Equality and Human Rights Commission. As part of that role, she sits on the legal working group of Equinet, the European Network of Equality Bodies. She also sits as a Legal Convener to the Mental Health Tribunal for Scotland.
Prior to joining the Commission, Lindsey worked at a national law centre in Scotland for over ten years, gaining experience in a range of areas of civil practice including mental health, refugee and asylum, discrimination, public law/ judicial review and housing/ homelessness.
Lindsey has an interest in legal education. She has a Masters degree in Human Rights Law and teaches human rights on the diploma in legal practice at the University of Glasgow.
Robin Wallace
Robin is the Advanced Specialist Care Operations Manager at Balhousie Care Group, having spent over 17 years’ experience working in the health and social care sector. Robin has held roles at frontline practice, management, and directorate level.
Robin has held several roles in private, statutory, and third sector organisations in areas such as Policy Implementation, Homelessness and Criminal Justice, and has a professional focus on workforce development, improvement methodologies, and strategic planning.
Robin also serves as a Trustee for Share Scotland, which is a third sector organisation focussed on realising life ambitions for people with additional support needs.
