Biographies
The biographies of all current members of the Committee are held here, if you require further information on current members please contact our Press Centre.
For higher resolution photographs of the Committee, please see the Gallery in our Press centre section.

Sir Christopher Kelly KCB
Appointed 1 Jan 2008 Term ends 31 Dec 2012Christopher Kelly is Chair of the Kings Fund and of the Financial Ombudsman Service. He was previously a civil servant. Between 1970 and 1995 he worked in HM Treasury, latterly as Director of Monetary and Fiscal Policy and then Director of the Budget and Public Finances. Between 1995 and 1997 he was Head of Policy Group at the then Department of Social Security. From 1997 to 2000 he was Permanent Secretary of the Department of Health. Since leaving the Civil Service he has chaired, or been a member of, a number of advisory and other groups in the public, private and voluntary sectors. He was Chairman of the NSPCC between 2002 and 2010.
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Oliver Heald MP
Appointed 1 Mar 2008 Re-appointed 1 Mar 2011 Term ends 28 Feb 2014Oliver Heald was called to the Bar in 1977 and has practised as a barrister on the South Eastern Circuit. He is a specialist in employment law. He was elected as Member of Parliament for North East Hertfordshire at the General Election of April 1992. He has served as a Minister in the Department of Social Security and is a former Shadow Leader of the House of Commons. He is currently a member of the Work and Pensions Select Committee and of the Committee of Selection.
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Sir Derek James Morris MA Dphil
Appointed 1 Mar 2008 Re-appointed 1 Mar 2011 Term ends 28 Feb 2014Sir Derek Morris has been Provost of Oriel College, Oxford since 2004. Prior to that he was Chairman of the Competition Commission (formerly the Monopolies and Mergers Commission). From 1970 to 1997 he was Fellow in Economics at Oriel College. In 2004-05 he chaired the Morris Review of the Actuarial Profession.
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Dame Denise Platt DBE
Appointed 1 July 2008 Re-appointed 1 July 2011 Term ends 30 June 2014Denise Platt is an Audit Commissioner and the Chair of the independent Advisory Panel for the Local Innovation Awards. From 2004 until 2009 she was the Chair of the Commission for Social Care Inspection (now the Care Quality Commission). She has held a variety of posts both nationally and locally in local government and social care. She is involved with a number of voluntary organisations and is the chair of the National AIDS Trust (NAT). She is governor of the University of Bedfordshire and a member of the Independent Review Board of the Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service.
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David Prince CBE
Appointed 1 June 2009 Term ends 31 May 2012David Prince is the former Chief Executive of The Standards Board for England. He held senior positions at the Audit Commission, as Managing Director, Strategy and Reources and District Audit. Previously his career was in local government, where posts included the Chief Executive of Leicestershire County Council and Director of Finance and Administration of Cambridgeshire County Council. He holds non-executive independent appointments as lay member of the General Social Care Council, member of Leicestershire Police Authority and the performance and best value committee of the Bar Standards Board.
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The Lord Alderdice
Appointed 1 September 2010 Term ends 31 August 2013John Alderdice is a fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. He led the Alliance Party and has held a variety of positions in the Federation of European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Parties and Liberal International. He was one of the negotiators of the Good Friday Agreement. Raised to the peerage on October 1996, he took his seat on the Liberal Democrat benches in the House of Lords on 5 November that year. In 1998 Lord Alderdice was elected member for Belfast East and appointed Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly. In 2004 he was appointed as a Commissioner for the newly established Independent Monitoring Commission.
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The Rt Hon Margaret Beckett MP
Appointed 1 November 2010 Term ends 1 November 2013The Rt Hon Margaret Beckett MP has been Labour MP for Derby South since 1983. She was Secretary of State for Trade and Industry 1997-98; President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons 1998-2001; Secretary of State for: Environment, Food and Rural Affairs 2001-06, Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs 2006-07; Minister for Housing and Planning (attending Cabinet), Department for Communities and Local Government 2008-09 and has been Chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee since 2008.
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