Trustee elections 2023

Trustee Elections

The results of the Trustee Elections have been announced at Butterfly Conservation's AGM on Saturday 4 November 2023. We can confirm that the following three candidates have been successfully elected (two have been re-elected) to the Board of Trustees.

• Glenn Allison
• Hugh Ellerton
• Catrin Evans

Statements of Candidates Confirmed for Trustee Elections 2023

The deadline for submitting nominations for this year’s Trustee Elections has now passed.

A total of three candidates have been proposed.

Please find below a list of the candidates, showing their name, photograph, and election statement (which sets out their background, qualifications and reasons for wanting to become a Trustee). The name of the Butterfly Conservation member proposing each candidate is also provided.

(candidates are listed alphabetically by surname)

Glenn Allison
Proposed by Ilija Vukomanovic

If elected, I would be honoured and excited to continue my contribution to the success of Butterfly Conservation as a member of Council where I served for the last 2 years. I am currently a member of the BC Strategic Reporting Group, the Investment Committee, and Chair of the BC Trustee Recruitment Panel. These bodies make positive and effective contributions to BC and form an important part of BC management and governance. I have a strong financial background and experience in strategy setting and long-term planning. It has been really rewarding to put these skills to good use with BC. I have worked closely with management in my role as Trustee and always place high value on the importance of people and communication skills. These are fundamentally important in so many organisations and perhaps especially so in BC given its working structures and public profile.

I live in Edinburgh, am an outdoors person and enjoy hillwalking, cycling, gardening and golf. I continue to learn so much about lepidoptera, especially those around me here in Scotland. I’m open and straightforward. I would be delighted to continue to bring my knowledge and skills to help Butterfly Conservation. I find Butterfly Conservation’s strategy and objectives hugely important and appealing. The outdoors and the environment are hugely important to our lifestyle, health and wellbeing.  Making the world a better place for butterflies and moths inevitably means making the world a better place for people everywhere. I’d like to help to achieve that objective.

Hugh Ellerton
Proposed by Laurence Harwood

I have a lifetime interest in Lepidoptera from school days and, for 62 years, as a member of the British Entomological and Natural History Society. Since retirement from the finance sector in 2019,  I have taken active roles in conservation, firstly in 2020 as a Trustee of the Butterfly Conservation and,  secondly, since 2022 as an independent member of the Finance and Audit Committee of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust (BBOWT).

I was elected Honorary Treasurer of Butterfly Conservation in 2022.  A lifetime in finance as a Chartered Accountant, a professional trustee and a regulated banker and investment advisor is well suited to the challenges that Butterfly Conservation faces as it embarks on a programme to raise the level of conservation awareness and to achieve ambitious targets to enhance the conservation of butterflies and moths. My experience in governance, risk, investment, and finance are particularly relevant and pertinent in this role.

Catrin Evans
Proposed by Apithanny Bourne

I am extremely proud to be standing for election as Trustee of Butterfly Conservation. I am a member of the Hertfordshire & Middlesex branch of Butterfly Conservation. I'm passionate about nature and the environment. Growing up in Cardigan Bay, Wales has inspired my interest in butterflies, wildlife, and conservation. During my career, I've collaborated with the British Antarctic Survey, Holland Park Ecology Centre, and Groundwork.

My motivation for joining Butterfly Conservation Council is in drawing on my skills to take the charity forward to achieve its mission. Various intersections of my identity reflect underrepresented groups. I’m passionate about Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion. I have an MPhil from the University of Cambridge. In October 2022, I completed Success on the Board (Advance HE & Wellcome), a programme targeted at people from groups currently underrepresented on governing bodies. To make an impact, I would draw on robust governance experience gained as a member of the Equality Advisory Group, and Chair of the LGBTQ+ Equality network at The Alan Turing Institute. This included working collaboratively on the development and launch of the EDI Strategy. At the London Ambulance Service, as a member of the Disability Awareness Forum, I led projects with the National Autistic Society. I have strong alignment with your vision, mission, and values. It’s clear from the ambitious goals in the Saving Butterflies and Moths’ strategy, that Butterfly Conservation is at a key point. Now is the time to act. It would be a great privilege to sit as Trustee of Butterfly Conservation. I trust I can count on your vote.

To be eligible to stand as a candidate for the position of Trustee, you must:

• Be over 18 years of age
• Not be disqualified from acting as a charity trustee
• Have not been convicted of an offence involving deception or dishonesty (or any such conviction is legally regarded as spent)
• Have not been involved in tax fraud
• Not be an undischarged bankrupt or have taken out an Individual Voluntary Arrangement
• Not made compositions or arrangement with your creditors from which you have not been discharged
• Not have been removed from serving as a charity trustee, or been stopped from acting in a management position within a charity
• Not have been disqualified from serving as a Company Director
• At all times ensure the charity's funds, and charity tax reliefs received by this organisation, are used only for charitable purposes.

How to Apply

Applications to become a BC Trustee are being run by Nurole, the board-level hiring platform. To find out more and apply, please read the Trustee Role Description and visit the Nurole website here or contact Sharon Maes at @email. 

You will need to request to become a member of Nurole, which is free and completely confidential. You can either apply through the link above or at nurole.com/request, quoting 'Butterfly2023'.

(Nurole has some criteria for membership and cannot guarantee an invitation to all who request it but if further assistance is needed, please contact @email.)

Further Information

Further information about becoming a Butterfly Conservation Trustee can be found in the documents linked below. More information about being a Trustee of a UK charity is available from the UK Charity Commission.

Deadlines

The deadline for completed applications to be received is 5pm on Thursday 14 April 2023.

The election results will be announced at Butterfly Conservation’s National AGM on Saturday 4 November 2023. Further details regarding the AGM will be provided shortly.

The timetable for the process is outlined below: