Reappointments to the Cafcass Board
Cafcass is pleased to announce that the Secretary of State for Justice has approved the reappointments of Catherine Doran and Mandy Jones, as members of the Cafcass Board, and has extended the tenure of Rohan Sivanandan.
Catherine Doran and Mandy Jones have been reappointed for one year from 14 May 2024 to 13 May 2025, to take them to the maximum tenure period of eight years permitted in legislation. The tenure of Rohan Sivanandan has been extended from 24 December 2024 to 30 June 2025.
Catherine Doran has a strong background in safeguarding, social work, and leading transformational change for communities, families and children. She has a particular interest in the impact domestic violence has on women and children. She has worked in a variety of public sector services over 30 years. Her portfolio at executive level has spanned both central and local government, the NHS and the not-for-profit sector.
She was previously an Executive Director of children and young people's services including schools and a Non-Executive Director at the Disclosure and Barring Service with a focus on systems delivery, partnerships and safeguarding standards. She is currently on the Children's Advisory panel of the British Board of Film Classification, the video appeals panel, a Trustee/Non-Exec at Save the Children with the lead on Safeguarding and is a Board member of Save the Children UK.
Mandy Jones first joined the Civil Service in 1990 as Policy Lead for the Prison Service Medical Directorate, whereafter she has undertaken a range of roles based in various locations across the UK and in France. The majority of her career has been focused on operational delivery, organisational improvement, change management and programme delivery, working in the Home Office, Ministry of Justice and for the Cabinet Office.
Working at senior level for the last 15 years of her career, Mandy was accountable for the delivery of a number of major organisational change programmes.
On leaving the Civil Service, she worked as Business Development Director for NSL where she engaged with public bodies to enable effective document authentication and identity validation to prevent illegal working, identity theft and fraud.
Mandy is currently a full-time foster carer and foster care ambassador based in Kent, where she lives with her husband and adult children. As a care leaver herself, and from the work she undertook within the National Prison and Probation Service, she understands the impact individuals can have in helping others change their lives and create better futures.
Rohan Sivanandan worked as an economist and senior executive in the private sector before moving into the education field. He worked across all phases of education, latterly as an education chief officer, before going on to set up his own consultancy specialising in organisational transformation and leadership coaching. He has held a number of board, non-executive and trustee positions, and has a particular interest in addressing social inequalities.
Currently, Rohan is a non-executive director for Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust where he chairs the workforce and education committee; a lay member of the Independent Reconfiguration Panel which provides advice to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care; an independent member of the Greater London Authority on Mayoral appointments. Rohan is a panel member for the Nursing and Midwifery Council’s Investigating Committee and chairs Mental Health Act hearings for the North London Mental Health NHS Partnership.
Reappointments to Cafcass are made by the Secretary of State for Justice. To learn more about the Cafcass Board and its members, visit: Our Board | Cafcass.