Youth Justice
Implementation of the recommendations of the Carlile Inquiry Report: Progress Report Jan. 2020
Future of The Youth Court Round Table
Youth Justice Developments & News
Youth Court or Crown Court?
Alliance for Youth Court Reform
Alliance Evidence Paper
Parliamentarians Inquiry
Action Plan 2012
Through the support of
Family and Youth Courts closer integration
Lady Elizabeth Haslam
Founder
Lady Elizabeth Haslam established the Foundation in 1987 in memory of the life and work of her husband Michael Sieff. Elizabeth has a background of welfare work in industry and the community.
Further information on Lady Haslam’s work is available from her website.
Richard White
Trustee
Richard White, Trustee, is a former Tribunal Judge of the First-tier Tribunal (the Social Entitlement Chamber); Visiting Professor of Child Law, Cardiff University; was Chairman of the Trustees of the Foundation until 31 December 2006. Richard acted as Secretary to the Foundation from 2006 to 2022.
Chris Stanley
Trustee
Chris Stanley, Retired senior magistrate. Formerly Chair, Youth Court panel and Kent Magistrates’ Association (MA) and member Youth Courts Committee at the MA. Trustee of the National Association for Youth Justice. Chair of Trustees ‘Transform Justice’ and member of the Standing Committee for Youth Justice. Formerly Head of Policy and Research at Nacro.
Maggie Atkinson
Trustee
Maggie Atkinson, is a qualified teacher and former Director of Children’s Services. She was president of the Association of Children’s Services (ADCS) in 2008-09 and the Children’s Commissioner for England from 2010 to 2015.
She is now chair of the LSCB for the Wirral, a consultant on leadership and management and serves several organisations as a Non-Executive Director or Trustee.
John Tenconi
Chairman
John Tenconi has been Chair of the Trustees of the Michael Sieff Foundation since 1 January 2007.
Barrister, Non Executive Director of a number of companies in the technology and financial services sector.
Dr. Eileen Vizard CBE
Trustee
Dr. Eileen Vizard CBE, Honorary Consultant Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist, Great Ormond Street Hospital, Honorary Senior Lecturer Institute of Child Health, UCL, Visiting Professor New York University in London.
Dr. Vizard has specialised in work with maltreated children and their families for nearly 40 years. Nearly 30 years ago, she set up a specialist service for children and young people who sexually harm others and who have complex developmental needs. At present, Dr. Vizard works in independent clinical practice as an Expert Witness, assessing young people as defendants in criminal proceedings as well as children and families within family proceedings where there are issues of maltreatment and parenting problems.
She has published more than 100 academic papers, continues to lecture nationally and internationally and advises government and policy makers in relation to child welfare.
John Drew
Trustee
John Drew CBE, was Chief Executive of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales from 2009 to 2013 and prior to that had spent a decade as a Director of Social Services and Housing in the east London Borough of Redbridge. He worked as a children’s social worker from 1974, qualifying in 1978.
Since retiring in 2013, he has had a number of non-executive and part-time roles. He is a Visiting Professor at the University of Bedfordshire and chairs the Medway Safeguarding Children’s Board. He was Secretary to the Laming Inquiry into children in care and the criminal justice system.
David Hitchcock
Secretary
David Hitchcock has been working alongside the Michael Sieff Foundation for over eight years, initially managing the website and more recently running Sieff meetings and events.
Former Trustees
Barbara Esam, who was a Sieff Trustee for ten years from 2005 to 2015, sadly passed away in July 2021 after a long battle with cancer. She was Public Policy Lawyer for the NSPCC from 1993 to 2012. Her work on early video interviewing of children who might have suffered abuse was seminal.
She contributed a wealth of expertise on child protection both personally and through a network of contacts from which the Foundation gained substantial benefit. Our thoughts are with her family.
Norman Woodhouse, who died in December 2020, worked with the Michael Sieff Foundation almost from its beginning. He worked with the late Lord Haslam, a former Chair of the Foundation, at British Coal. He had an ethical approach to whatever he tackled. He was unfailingly helpful and positive, thoughtful and ever willing to discuss.
He organised the Foundation’s twenty year celebration and assembled the brochure published in 2009 to showcase the Foundation’s achievements. He assisted Lady Haslam with her Special Projects, which among other things enabled the Foundation to publish a training and jobs pack for every Young Offender Institution.
The Foundation would be a poorer institution had Norman not been part of it.
Peter Harris, a former Trustee of the Michael Sieff Foundation, passed away in August 2020. Peter was the Official Solicitor from 1993 to 1999. He made a substantial contribution to child welfare and child protection services. When he retired he accepted an invitation to become a Trustee of the Foundation.
He played an important role in our work, in particular as Secretary and in setting up the current charitable status in 2005. He continued to serve as a Trustee until 2007.
David Jefferies CBE, a much valued Trustee of the Foundation since 2004 passed away on 19 March 2016. David was Past Chairman of National Grid Group PLC; Past Master of the Worshipful Company, Wax Chandlers; Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering; Hon. Vice President British Limbless Ex Servicemen’s Association; Parliamentary Group for Energy Studies, Life Member.
Rupert Hughes, a former trustee of the Michael Sieff Foundation, passed away in August 2015. On retirement in 1997 Rupert became a Trustee and remained so until 2003. Thereafter he contributed his considerable wisdom to the organisation of Sieff conferences at Cumberland Lodge and most recently as part of a Sieff group discussing the setting up of the Carlile Inquiry Report and the recommendations emerging from it.