We are delighted to have the following five judges involved in our first Spirit of Manchester Awards
- Lord Mayor of Manchester – Councillor Naeem ul Hassan
- Jez Myers - riot clean up man
- Val Jones - Chief Executive Officer, Social Enterprise North West of England
- Atiha Chaudry - Deputy Lieutenant of Greater Manchester
- Maya Sharma - Heritage Lottery Fund
Lord Mayor of Manchester – Councillor Naeem ul Hassan
Councillor Naeem ul Hassan was born in Lahore, Pakistan and moved to Manchester in 1984.
Councillor Hassan is proud of his diverse working background in many different vocations including driving taxis, security, hospitality management, a Race Officer and then a Community Liaison Officer for the GMB Trade Union for the Lancashire region. He began working life as a factory worker, before returning to further his education at MANCAT College. He completed a BTEC in
Engineering and an ‘A’ Level in Information Technology and this led him to gain employment as an instructor and internal NVQ assessor.
Councillor Hassan has always had a keen interest in justice, and this led him to train as a Magistrate on the Manchester Bench. He became involved in politics as he wanted to make a positive impact on policies that in turn would improve
services for the residents and people of Manchester.
Councillor Hassan was elected as a Labour Councillor for the Cheetham Ward of Manchester in 2006 and since then he has served on several Council Committees including: the Citizenship and Inclusion, Finance and General Purposes and Health and Well-being Scrutiny Committees; and the Constitutional and Nomination and Licensing and Appeals Committees. He has also held the position of Assistant Executive Member for Adult Services.
In addition to being a Councillor and a Magistrate, he also serves the community as:
- Secretary General of the Asian Community
- Development Trust
- Executive Member of the Manchester Mega Mela
- National Executive Member Muslim for Labour
- Deputy Chair of the Abraham Moss High School
- Governing Body
- Board Member of Northwards Housing
- Representative on the Pennine Acute Joint Scrutiny
- Committee
- Director of First Asian Support Trust (FAST) a Welfare to
- Work organisation providing employment and Training to
- Disabled people
- Advisory member on various other boards
He now hopes to continue delivering to his community and the residents of Manchester as Lord Mayor for 2013/14. Councillor Naeem ul Hassan and his wife Zulleh Huma Hassan have been happily married for 28 years and have
five children Sumera, Saima, Anna, Naveed and Sahil. He is proud to have brought up and educated his children in the local Community. His wife and children are now working as professionals in the Education, Medical, Legal
and Finance sectors.
Jez Myers
Having spent nearly a decade working within the social housing and homelessness sector, Jeremy accidentally found himself thrust into the wider public’s consciousness when, following the riots of August 2011, he organised a community clean up.
In little over 12 hours and harnessing the power of social media, 1,000 volunteers armed with brushes, bin bags and gloves took to the city’s streets.
Jeremy went on to be described as ‘a true Manchester hero’ by Manchester City Council and ‘a great Briton’ by Prime Minister David Cameron before winning the prestigious Pride of Manchester award.
Val Jones
Chief Executive Officer, Social Enterprise North West of England
Val is an inspirational leader in the UK social enterprise sector, bringing great vision and energy to collaborate with, equip and empower others to positively impact their communities. This comes from her great passion for the motivations of social and community enterprises, the people who run them and the people they serve.
During the past four years Val has been an instrumental innovator as Chief Executive for Social Enterprise North West, attracting and managing multi-million pound European Social Fund and Development Fund programmes to stimulate the growth and development of what is a thriving and broad social enterprise sector in the North West of England
Before her time at Social Enterprise North West, Val developed a successful career across many sectors, working at senior management level with many highly regarded and well known organisations, including Centre for Arts Development Training, Hope Street International Arts Centre, North Liverpool Regeneration Company and South Sefton Development Trust.
An experienced consultant in many disciplines, Val has been an invaluable asset to many organisations over the years, not to mention her extended and extensive commitments at Board level including Council Member of Social Enterprise Coalition and Chair of North West Network for Europe Voluntary Sector Organisation.
Atiha Chaudry
Deputy Lieutenant of Greater Manchester
Atiha Chaudry has over 25 years of experience within the public, voluntary and community sectors and has worked for a range of organisations including the National Association of Local Government Women’s’ Committees, Newcastle City Council, the Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES), and since setting up her consultancy company, Equal Access Consultancy she has worked on many commissions locally, nationally and at an international level.
She has lived and worked in Manchester for 25 years and has a great deal of knowledge of the area and its needs both at the local level and across the region. She has spent some of the time living and working abroad and had the experience of working for the Brunei Civil Service institute delivering training on a Women and Leadership programme.
Atiha has extensive community and voluntary sector experience gained over many years of voluntary work in the community. She is passionate and committed to the community and voluntary sector and over the years has given her time generously to the sector. She has been a Board member for the Progress Trust ( Manchester), the Women’s Action Forum (Manchester), Saheli ( Newcastle ) the DfES National Steering Group on ICT and BME Communities ,the Manchester Council for Community Relations , the Urban Forum (National) , the Asian Parent Carer ( of disabled children ) project ( Manchester ), Rafiki Women’s group ( Manchester ) which she helped set up, and the Community Foundation for Greater Manchester .
Atiha is currently Chair of the Manchester BME network, the GM BME Network project and the Manchester Equalities Hub. She is a board member for the Manchester Settlement; the Centre for Local Economic Strategies and The Manchester Partnership. She has served as a Justice of the Peace at the Stockport Magistrates Court since 2001.
Atiha was appointed Deputy Lieutenant of Greater Manchester in 2012.
Maya Sharma
Development Officer, Heritage Lottery Fund North West
Maya has many years of working and volunteering in the voluntary sector. She's worked in voluntary sector support and infrastructure at local, regional and national levels over the years; she also has experience of volunteering and of sitting on Management Committees since her teens. Although Maya has worked across the sector in generic roles, she also has experience of working with more specialist parts of the sector, for example working with BME and refugee /asylum seeker advice projects in London, or more recently working for Oxfam with BME women's groups in the North West. She was also a member of the Greater Manchester BME Network Steering group in its initial years.
Maya currently works as a Development Officer for the Heritage Lottery Fund (North West), and feels her years of experience working within the voluntary sector equip her well for providing support and guidance to groups seeking funding for heritage projects.