Our people

Lucy joined Kinship (then Grandparents Plus) as Chief Executive in September 2015. While at the charity, she has overseen a merger, strategic review and name change to reflect the charity’s focus on transforming support for kinship families.

During this time, the charity has grown in size and impact, including through pioneering evidence-informed programmes, expanding peer support approaches and influencing policy and practice. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she led Kinship’s activities focusing on understanding, advocating for, and responding to the specific needs of kinship care families, with significant extension of support services across England and Wales. Since then, Kinship has led the development and delivery of 2 new national services for kinship carers in England, the Peer Support Service and Training and Support Service, both funded by the Department for Education.

She is a frequent media spokesperson on kinship care, including recent interviews on BBC News, Sky News, Channel 5 News, BBC World at One, BBC Five Live and Radio 4 Woman’s Hour.

Previously she spent 11 years at The Fostering Network where she was Director of External Affairs and then Director of Development. Her teams led the successful Staying Put campaign, the introduction of Mockingbird, the London Fostering Achievement programme, the development of The Skills to Foster, delivery of Foster Care Fortnight and foster carer recruitment projects with the Department for Education and local authorities.

She has a PhD in politics from Southampton University and has worked in research roles in universities and the voluntary sector. She has 3 teenage children.

For any enquiries for Lucy, please contact Executive Assistant, Vikkie Chapman: vikkie.chapman@kinship.org.uk.

You can also follow Lucy on X (formerly Twitter).

Rhiannon has more than a decade’s experience delivering successful communications, engagement and campaign strategies across the charity, private and public sectors.

Contact: rhiannon.clapperton@kinship.org.uk

Lisa has extensive experience of building and leading campaigns, communications and public affairs teams across the charity and public sector, delivering award winning campaigns delivering changes to behaviour, policy and legislation.

Contact: lisa.watch@kinship.org.uk

Emma joined Kinship in July 2020 to set-up our award winning Covid-19 Kinship Response, having previously supported the charity as a strategic consultant focussing on programme development.

Contact: emma.wrafter@kinship.org.uk

Sandie joined Kinship in December 2023 as Director of Development, leading on Fundraising and Business Development activities for the organisation. Sandie is passionate about ensuring support is available and accessible to the most vulnerable in our society.

Contact: sandie.bailey@kinship.org.uk

Vikkie joined Kinship in June 2021. She provides administrative support for the CEO and wider Executive Team. She also provides governance support for the Board of Trustees, Finance Committee and Kinship Carer Advisory Group, as well as administrative support for our Professionals’ Network and Researchers’ Network.

Caroline is the Charity Director at Age UK, the national charity for older people, and co-chair of the Care and Support Alliance which brings together 60+ charities campaigning for good adult social care for all. She spent the first half of her career working in policy for children, young people and families. This included being an adviser to Ed Balls in the Department for Children, Schools and Families, where she focused on children’s social care, family policy and child poverty, as well as previously working for the Local Government Association and Action for Children.  She was also chair of the End Child Poverty campaign. Caroline was awarded a CBE in 2021 for services to older people and to the voluntary sector.

Julian is a senior partner at Ernst & Young and has over 25 years’ experience in financial services. He leads in the Wealth & Asset Management sector and has gathered experience in the UK, Australia and the US. Julian’s experience encompasses a wide variety of disciplines including assurance, regulatory advice, governance, risk and M&A, working with innovative start-ups through to large international firms.

He holds a BSc (Hons) in Mathematics from Imperial College and is a chartered accountant (ACA). Julian has two teenage children, and experience of adoptive care in his wider family.

James is an experienced strategist, specialising in developing new teams and digital ventures within and for organisations. James started his career at Deloitte before moving to help setup an AI platform at a leading Magic Circle law firm. James has since moved to WT Consulting, and is responsible for building out the UK practice.

James is an entrepreneurially-minded professional with a postgraduate degree in Strategy and Innovation from the University of Oxford and a BSc in Economics & Politics from the University of Southampton.

Beverley has spent 30 years working within the children’s social care sector. She is currently Associate Director for Practice and Impact at the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory. She works on expanding the capacity of the Nuffield FJO to make its evidence count on the practice front by making connections, developing conversations, and fostering opportunities for innovations and activities that will unlock systemic change in the family justice system. Beverley has previously worked in frontline roles within social work practice and management roles in local authority and family court settings. She is also a member of the FDAC partnership. In June 2018, Beverley received an MBE for her work with children and families.

Fran is an experienced marketeer who has held Director level roles in charities and social enterprises including Turning Point and at social housing provider Places For People. Fran currently works with the National Collaborative Outreach Programme which supports the government’s social mobility goals in increasing the number of young people from underrepresented groups going into higher education. With kinship care experience working with her family to support the upbringing of her nephew and niece, Fran was motivated to join the Board of Kinship to help make life easier for other kinship carers, and to help as many children as possible stay within their families.

Joe is an experienced policy and strategic thinker. He has previously worked for a number of Members of Parliament which developed his policy and strategy expertise on a number of different areas including in housing, social security, social care and criminal justice.

As a Councillor in Lambeth, Joe sat on the Corporate Parenting Board and the Children’s Services Scrutiny Sub-Committee. In particular, he focused on ensuring young people’s voices were heard and that they were able to evaluate and mould services and delivery.

Elaine Farmer is Emeritus Professor of Child and Family Studies at the University of Bristol.  She spent several years as a social worker in the UK and Australia before moving into research and teaching. She used to teach on the qualifying post-qualifying programmes in social work at the university and was formerly the Head of the Centre for Family Policy and Child Welfare at the university. Her research interests on which she has published widely include foster and residential care, the reunification of separated children with their families, child protection and kinship care. She has undertaken studies in a number of Department of Health and Department for Education research programmes, including on child protection, residential care, family support, adoption and neglect.

Her publications include: Kinship Care: Fostering Effective Family and Friends Placements (Jessica Kingsley 2008); Spotlight on Kinship Care: Using Census micro data to examine the extent and nature of kinship care in the UK at the turn of the twentieth century (University of Bristol 2011) and The Poor Relations? Children and informal kinship carers speak out (University of Bristol 2013). The latter study was an investigation of informal kinship care, funded by the Big Lottery. She also worked with a team of researchers on the Grandparent’s Plus study Growing Up in Kinship Care: Experiences as Adolescents and Outcomes in Young Adulthood (Grandparents Plus 2017).

Janet is a kinship carer to her oldest grandson who is 9 and who has been with us since he was 18 months old. She is also an adopter of 25 years with three adult adopted children and three more grandchildren. She worked as a social worker and then as a lecturer in further and higher education until she retired early to care for her grandson. Her main subjects were safeguarding, children and families and children’s development. She likes to socialise with friends and family, go for walks and read. As well as her involvement with Kinship, Janet also volunteers as an independent visitor for a care leaver and her baby and campaigns with a local adoption group to improve adoption support.

Yvette became Ofsted’s National Director, Social Care in April 2018. Prior to taking up this post, Yvette was Director of Children’s Services in the London Borough of Merton, a position she held for over 9 years following a 20 year children’s services career in London.

Yvette’s career has been shaped by her passion for making a difference for children and in particular the most vulnerable; her commitment to creating an environment across all children’s services where the very best practice can thrive; and a deep interest in system, organisational and institutional self-evaluation to support continuous improvement and effectiveness. Yvette has two adult children, one with autism, and prior to her current post was a longstanding FE Governor and keen supporter of a range of children’s charities, including serving at board level for a number of years.