Home-Start Wandsworth is governed by a group of volunteer trustees. Their job is to guide and govern the scheme and each trustee brings a different skill. They meet regularly to plan the direction of the charity and lead any activities that support the work of the coordinators and volunteers.
Maria Kinsella, Chair of Trustees
Maria joined Home-Start Wandsworth as a volunteer supporting families in 2010 in the second wave of volunteers and has gone on to become a trustee as part of the Fundraising Committee in 2016 and then Chair of the Trustees since 2017. She has extensive experience in a number of volunteering and charity roles including fundraising for Shooting Star Chase, Vice Chair of the Friends of King’s College School, volunteering in the Putney Cards for Good Causes shop and Glass Door Homeless Charity and working in the Wandsworth Foodbank. Before stopping work to start her family, Maria was an HR Manager for Ernst & Young.
maria@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Laura Lewis, Fundraising Committee (former Chair)
Laura practised in the City as a solicitor for five years specialising in banking finance before becoming an executive search consultant in the corporate field. Laura is currently a magistrate covering the South West London area and having played an instrumental role in the formation of Home-Start Wandsworth has acquired expertise in fundraising and developing the strategy for Home-Start Wandsworth. While she was Chair of Trustees for Home-start Wandsworth for over just over seven years she was responsible for raising funds including a five year grant from BIG Lottery and many other grants that have sustained the growth of HSW. She was also responsible for creating and growing our most profitable event of the year, the annual Home-Start Wandsworth quiz.
laura@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Holly Stilgoe, Vice Chair and Fundraising Trustee
Holly became a trustee in early 2015, having been a home-visiting volunteer for Home-Start since 2014. She used to work as a criminal defence solicitor at a firm based in the Borough of Wandsworth and has extensive experience of volunteering. She also volunteers with Little Village, one of Home-Start Wandsworth’s local charity partners. She was appointed Vice Chair of Trustees in early 2017 and she continues to organise fundraising events and write grant applications.
holly@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Dr. Tudor Nicholls (PhD), Treasurer
Tudor is a retired Chartered Accountant with years of corporate accountancy experience and was a member of the PricewaterhouseCoopers Charity Trustee Network. In addition to maintaining financial controls and supporting funding applications he monitors the budget to ensure financial viability is maintained.
tudor@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Kirsten Ledwards, Marketing & Communications Trustee
Kirsten is a marketing and communications professional with 20 years’ experience delivering marketing strategies and communications campaigns in both the private and public sectors. She started out as a volunteer for Home-Start Wandsworth in 2011 while she studied for her Psychotherapy and Counselling certificate and is now a trustee offering marketing and communications support for the scheme.
kirsten@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Karen Robertson, HR Trustee
Karen has a wealth of experience in senior HR roles in IT and Telecommunications in the private sector and ensures that our legal and contractual obligations to our employees are met and maintained, as well as contributing her general business experience to the management of the scheme. Karen is also a trustee of the Home-Start London consortium.
karen@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Sam Wemyss, Fundraising Trustee
Sam previously worked in operations management within the investment banking sector and subsequently has volunteered for a number of charities working on corporate fundraising, education and charity partnerships. She is also a Home-start volunteer.
sam@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Kate Swinburn (PhD), Health, Policy and Diversity Trustee
Kate has 25 years experience of working across acute and community settings in the NHS, in academia and in the third sector. She has professional interest in outcome measurement and disability issues. Kate has experience of, and contacts in, the local health economy (the local CCG and Public Health). She was impressed by the passion and professionalism of Home-Start Wandsworth, and wished to offer her skills to support local families. She brings her professional experience to support strategic and operational planning at Home-Start Wandsworth.
kate@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Jamie Fergusson, Deputy Treasurer
Jamie began a career in investment management and worked for a number of years with Jupiter Asset management before moving into roles in private practice as a consultant financial adviser, specialising in investment management and personal tax planning. He became a trustee and honorary adviser to the finance committee of the Royal Medical Benevolent Fund in 2012, a charity which provides financial and practical help to doctors, medical students and their families who by reason of mental or physical ill health find themselves unable to practise or in financial difficulties. He joined Home-Start Wandsworth as a trustee in 2015 and is the Deputy to the Treasurer.
jamie@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Linda Hayllar, Fundraising Committee
Linda joined Home-Start Wandsworth as a trustee in 2015. Her main focus is on fundraising activities as part of our Fundraising Committee. She has extensive experience in a number of charity roles as a Committee member of Putney Parish action and Chair of the Putney Parish Action Ball. She was also the Treasurer of the Putney NCT branch. Before she started her family, Linda was a solicitor focusing on commercial property.
linda@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
Preya Chauhan, Fundraising Committee
Preya joined Home-Start Wandsworth in 2018 as beneficiary of help. Having relocated to London at 8 months pregnant, hundreds of miles from close friend and family, a health worker referred Preya to our services. She found solace and specialist support through our home visiting befriending volunteer
In 2020 Preya joined Home-Start Wandsworth as a trustee. Preya enjoys volunteering and has done so with the Red Cross in Ecuador, Greenpeace Birmingham and Nritya Arts a local Asian Youth Arts organisation. With an extensive and varied career working in the Arts and Health sectors over the past 20 years, she seeks to bring a fresh eye to our programmes. Utilising her recent experience working
Preya enjoys traveling in her new motorhome Bertie with her family, Science fiction Audiobooks and her newfound love off embroidery.
preya@homestartwandsworth.org.uk
