Open Meeting 2001: Speakers' Biographies

Victor Benjamin
Acting Chairman, English Partnerships

Victor Benjamin practised as a solicitor at Berwin Leighton in the area of property finance, mergers and acquisitions, retiring as a partner in the firm in 1994. He is now a consultant to the firm. In 1971 he joined the Board of Lex Service and became Deputy Chairman in 1973. In 1982 he became a director of Tesco and was appointed Deputy Chairman in 1983, retiring in 1996. He becameChairman of Wincanton plc in March 2001 and is a trustee of the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich.

Paula Hay-Plumb
Chief Executive, English Partnerships

Paula Hay-Plumb is a Member of the Board and Chief Executive of English Partnerships. She was Chairman of the Coalfields Task Force which reported to the Deputy Prime Minister in 1998 and is a Trustee of the Coalfields Regeneration Trust. She is a Director of Priority Sites Ltd, English Partnerships´ joint venture with The Royal Bank of Scotland. Paula qualified as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG and is a member of the Association of Corporate Treasurers. After four years with Marks & Spencer plc, she joined Olympia and York Canary Wharf Limited and was a key member of the team which successfully restructured the Canary Wharf development in London´s Docklands.

Peter Springett
Area Director (Housing) South, English Partnerships

Peter Springett is a Chartered Surveyor with over 30 years´ experience in property development. Over the past 10 years, Peter has been responsible for bringing forward residential opportunities in the former English New Towns. Prior to this he worked within the public sector and with particular responsibilities for development lead initiatives.

John V. M. Best
Strategic Director - Environment, Milton Keynes Council

For the last five years John Best has been Strategic Director - Environment for Milton Keynes Council, which became a Unitary Authority in April 1997 and serves a population of just over 210,000. He has responsibility for a range of Environmental Services including Planning, Architecture, Regulatory Services, Highways, Landscape & Countryside, Waste and the Council´s own contracting organisation, Synergy. John gained a degree in Engineering with Social Studies from Sussex University in the sixties. He worked in the commercial entertainment field for two years before training as a town planner in the seventies and surveyor in the eighties. In the nineties he obtained an MBA. He worked for 24 years in planning and urban regeneration in London before joining Milton Keynes Council.

Euan Hall
Divisional Director, Coalfields/Joint Ventures, English Partnerships

Euan Hall is a general practice Chartered Surveyor with over 20 years´ experience in the industry in both the private and public sectors, with over half of this experience in economic development and urban regeneration. He is currently Divisional Director for Coalfield/Joint Ventures within English Partnerships, with responsibility for several of the organisation´s key areas of operation, including the National Coalfield Programme, Priority Sites, Networkspace and other joint ventures. He is also responsible for establishing English Partnerships´ Land Stabilisation Programme to deal with areas affected by former non-coal mine workings across England. Prior to joining English Partnerships in 1998, Euan spent seven years as Head of Property with Scottish Enterprise.

Geoff Hatfield
Director, Forest Enterprise England

Geoff Hatfield is the Director for Forest Enterprise England. Forest Enterprise is an executive agency of the Forestry Commission, responsible for the management of the Forestry Commission estate (which extends to 265,000 hectares in England).

Duncan Innes
Head of Millennium Communities, English Partnerships

Duncan Innes has some 20 years´ experience in the property development industry and has worked in both the private and public sectors. Specialising in major residential and mixed-use developments, his current role is the co-ordination of English Partnerships´ Millennium Communities programme. This is a national programme which aims to produce tangible examples of sustainable mixed-use development in a variety of locations across the country.

Clive Wilding
Managing Director, Raven Residential

Clive Wilding, a director of the Housing Forum, was until very recently Managing Director of Gleeson Homes. He has now left to focus on urban development and has joined The Raven Group as Managing Director of Raven Residential. In his time at Gleeson he was responsible for heading up the Allerton Bywater project, the second Millennium Community, as well as other large regeneration projects involving partnerships with local authorities and DTLR development agencies.

Ram Gidoomal CBE, FRSA
Board Member, English Partnerships

Ram Gidoomal is Chairman of Winning Communications Partnership and on the European Advisory Board of NASDAQ-quoted Syntel Inc and Business Europe Ltd. He is a member of the Better Regulation Task Force and on the Ethnic Minority Advisory Group of the New Deal Task Force. He is a non-executive Director of the Epsom and St Helier NHS Trust; a Board Member of the Covent Garden Market Authority; a Council Member of the Institute of Employment Studies; and represents English Partnerships on the Board of London First Centre. He is a Trustee of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce; Visiting Professor at Middlesex University in Entrepreneurship and Inner City Regeneration; and is a Member of the Court of the University of Luton.