London FA: As part of a strategic commitment to make football in London as diverse as the capital city itself, a third of its newly appointed board members are from diverse ethnic backgrounds while nearly half are female

The London Football Association continues to lead the way in corporate governance by announcing their new Board for the period January 2021 to January 2004 and new Council for the period between December 2020 to December 2023.

A statement said: “As part of a strategic commitment to make football in London as diverse as the capital city itself, a third of its newly appointed board members are from diverse ethnic backgrounds while nearly half are female. “

Four members are joining the London FA Board for the first time. They are:

Jill Berry – HR Director at Christie’s
Christina Oshodi – LTA Safeguarding Committee member and experienced football coach
Karen Greene – League Secretary of the Camden & Islington Youth Football League
Mark Deveney – Chairman of Erith Town Football Club.

Paul Bickerton, CEO of London FA said: “Our corporate governance reforms led us to run two separate recruitment processes. The first was to elect four members from our London FA Council to become Council-elected Non-Executive Board Directors.

“The second was an open recruitment drive to bring a wide range of football and business skills onto the Board. All Directors, new or existing, had to apply through one of those two channels and the open recruitment initiative attracted overwhelming support from the sporting and business communities. As a result, we received 144 applications for the Non-Executive Board roles.” 

The open recruitment process was supported by an independent recruitment panel specially selected for the task, who worked with the London FA’s Nominations & Remunerations Committee to select the new members.

This panel was made up of several public sector recruitment and diversity specialists, to include Arun Kang – CEO at Sporting Equals. 

This recruitment process and the new Board adhere in full to Tier 3 of Sport England and UK Sport’s Code for Sports Governance and the more recently released FA Regional Code of Governance for County Football Associations. 

James Middlehurst, London FA Chair said: “I was extremely impressed by the calibre of applicants and we have strengthened our board with a group of talented and highly qualified individuals. 

“Our new board members’ wealth of diverse management skills, experience and backgrounds puts us in a very strong position and we’re looking forward to entering an exciting and progressive era for the London FA.”

New London FA Council

An open recruitment process, again supported by the independent recruitment panel, has also resulted in a new London FA Council being in post as of 1st December 2020.

Over a third of the new London FA Council are from a diverse ethnic background and a quarter are now female, demonstrating further that London FA is making significant strides to reflect the many different and varied communities that play football across the capital.

A full list of the new London FA Council can be found here and the full London FA Board is as follows:

• Independent Non-Executive Directors
  o James Middlehurst, Chair
  o Sir Simon Hughes, Senior Independent Director
  o Alistair Morgan, Finance & Risk Director
  o Jill Berry

• Non-Executive Football Directors
  o Paul Mortimer
  o Roger Fox
  o Karen Greene
  o Christina Oshodi

• Council-elected Football Directors
  o Ian Wallis
  o Beth Archer
  o Yashmin Harun
  o Mark Deveney
  
  Visit London Football Association: www.londonfa.com