Governance

Kim Fletcher was appointed to the board of the NCTJ in June 2004 and is its current chairman.

He is a partner at the international, corporate communications firm Brunswick. He was previously editorial director of Telegraph Group Ltd, publisher of The Daily Telegraph, The Sunday Telegraph, and telegraph.co.uk. Kim read law at Hertford College, Oxford, before joining The Star, Sheffield, which sponsored him on the postgraduate journalism course at University College, Cardiff. He left Sheffield – having gained his NCTJ proficiency certificate – to freelance on Fleet Street, before joining the staff of The Sunday Times.

In 1998, after four years as deputy editor of The Sunday Telegraph, he was appointed editor of The Independent on Sunday. In 25 years on Fleet Street, Kim has written for most national newspapers as a news reporter, sports columnist or feature writer. Kim is editor of the quarterly publication British Journalism Review and author of The Journalist’s Handbook, published by Macmillan.

A former journalist and editor, Lynne is the deputy CEO of the News Media Association, the voice of UK national, regional and local news media.

Lynne has management, public affairs and finance responsibilities for the NMA as well as overseeing an integrated communications strategy, digital media issues, audience measurement and member services. She sits on various industry boards including the Advertising Association, ABC and JICREG.

Previously communications & marketing director of the Newspaper Society, the voice of local media, she became communications director for the Newspaper Publishers Association in 2009 and NPA deputy director in 2012.

Lynne has written and contributed to numerous articles, analyst reports, research studies and publications; given evidence as an expert witness before parliamentary select committees in both the Commons and the Lords; advised city analysts, regulators, civil servants and ministers; written speeches and articles for senior politicians and members of the Royal Family; and given print, radio and television interviews on behalf of the newspaper and news media sector.

Abu Bundu-Kamara is a diversity & inclusion strategist and thought leader who is passionate about helping leaders and companies embrace change in a New World Marketplace. With a proven track record and over 20 years’ experience in business and human resource management, he works with leaders to embed diversity & inclusion in their decision making through both system redesign and leadership development. Abu currently works for Boeing, as their global diversity and inclusion lead.

Abu has previously worked for Pearson, BAE Systems, Ryman’s, Enron and The Canary Wharf Management Group.

Andy Cairns was executive editor at Sky Sports News between 1998 and 2019.

An NCTJ alumnus, Andy started his career on local newspapers in Surrey and South London before joining BBC East and then BBC News as a producer. He moved to Sky News, where he worked as a reporter, presenter and sports editor, before launching Sky Sports News in 1998.

Andy was a member of the NCTJ accreditation board since its inaugural meeting in September 2010 and 2019 and became chairman of the board in 2016.

Alan Edmunds is group chief operating officer for Reach, a role he assumed in July 2020, having spent the previous ten months running the regionals division of the business.

Before taking on the regionals MD role, Alan had fulfilled the role of editorial director for regionals since 2017, having previously been MD and Editor in Chief at Media Wales.

At Media Wales, Alan had overall responsibility for the Western Mail, WalesOnline, the South Wales Echo, a series of weekly titles as well as Wales on Sunday and a portfolio of free magazines.

Under Alan’s leadership, Media Wales became the first fully integrated regional newsroom in the UK (merging five separate teams formed around each title into a single team producing the whole digital and print portfolio) in 2007, having been sent to Europe and America by the company to study new ways of working.

Alan, who studied law at Bristol University before taking a postgraduate journalism diploma at Cardiff University, is a Cardiff boy who joined Media Wales as a trainee reporter in 1986.

He held various reporter and management titles with the company before becoming editor of Wales on Sunday in 1997 and then taking the helm of the Western Mail five years later.

He also sits on the board of the National Council for the Training of Journalists.

He is married with three daughters.

Toby Granville has been the editorial director at Newsquest – the second largest regional newspaper publisher in the UK – since February 2015. Toby began his career in 1990 at the Sunday People. He gained his first editorship at the age of 26 at The Wharf which won Newspaper of the Year under his leadership.

Since joining Newsquest in 2002 Toby has edited a number of its award-winning daily titles such as the Dorset Echo and Bournemouth Daily Echo and was named Editor of the Year in 2011. In his current role Toby is leading the editorial strategy in Newsquest’s newsrooms publishing more than 160 local and regional titles across the UK.

Dr Colm Murphy is Subject Leader in Media, Film and Journalism at Ulster University in Northern Ireland. A multi award winning lecturer and journalist, in May 2021 he was made a Principal Fellow of the UK’s Higher Education Academy, one of the highest awards in international education. He has written for The Sunday Times, London, for over 25 years and has made over 11 investigative documentaries for RTE. He has worked in journalism in the Middle East, Turkey, Russia, Poland and India.

He holds a PhD in digital media policy and has advised governments and organisations on digital strategy, law and safety. His research on improving the safety of journalists particularly in conflict areas and from digital media abuse has been used by UNESCO and the World Journalism Education Council.

Jas was appointed as the financial trustee of NCTJ in September 2019.

She spent 11 years at Pearson PLC where her most recent role was international finance director for Pearson Vue, the global professional assessments division. Prior to that she worked for three years at the Financial Times Group, the parent company of the FT newspaper, as their head of financial planning and analysis.

Jas recently opted for a change in direction to her career and is now working for a not for profit GP federation in central London. She is also a volunteer at several charities.

Jas has been a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants since 2000 and has a broad range of experience working in commercial and technical financial roles.

Neil was appointed commercial director of NLA media access in October 2016. Prior to that he spent 30 years as a magazine publisher working across a number of key sectors including custom publishing, consumer and B2B in businesses ranging from the FT, Puzzler and DC Thomson, the latter as head of publishing. He oversees NLA’s end user licensing operation, based in Tunbridge Wells, as well as its teams responsible for business development, publisher services and media monitoring organisation liaison.

Since joining Sky News in 1995, John Ryley has been at the heart of Sky News’ success and transformation into a world-class news organisation.

In 2009 he launched a campaign for leaders’ debates which have transformed the nature of the election campaign, raising voters’ interest and heightening political engagement. It led to a call by CBS anchor Dan Rather for his knighthood “for getting these debates on the air because for the first time the British public gets to see the three candidates, no filter, right in front of themselves for three good sessions.” John has begun a campaign for cameras in court.

During his time at Sky News, John has pioneered innovative, live coverage of breaking news and news events for the award-winning channel. Credits include Sky News’ extensive live coverage of the Louise Woodward case in 1997, which secured the channel’s biggest audience yet. He produced Sky’s RTS award-winning coverage of the Princess of Wales’s funeral and as executive editor took a leading role in Sky’s coverage of the 9/11 attacks, for which the channel won its first BAFTA award.

In August 2002, John was responsible for devoting the channel’s output to coverage of the Soham murders, for which it won a second BAFTA award and an RTS award. John began his career in television news as a graduate news trainee at the BBC, followed by a stint on the BBC Nine O’clock News.

He joined ITN in 1990 and went on to become assistant programme editor on News at Ten and edited all ITV’s news shows. John was educated at Durham University and the Wharton School of Management.

Abbie Scott is the deputy managing editor at the Financial Times. She has oversight of global operations in the editorial department and management of 600 journalists at the FT. Abbie is focused on making sure that FT journalists are equipped to work in an ever-changing industry and are representative of the communities we serve. Abbie’s career has involved a number of senior roles in editorial management including at The Telegraph and the FT. Abbie is also a member of the Senior Management Group of the FT Group.

Jo Webster is the deputy global editor for visuals at Reuters, the world’s largest independent news organisation. Jo helps to create and execute strategy for Reuters’ award-winning video and pictures team, driving value for Reuters’ media customers and consumers.

Prior to this role she was managing editor for strategy and operations in EMEA, responsible for multimedia coverage, speed, editorial staff security, training, budgets, strategic workforce planning and diversity. Jo joined Reuters in 2009 as a senior producer for Insider Financial TV. In 2015, she launched Reuters TV – a flagship consumer TV offering designed to showcase Reuters award-winning journalism and geographical reach on cutting-edge digital platforms.

Jo started her career in the trade press and had a front row seat to the 2007 financial crisis as a producer and on-screen reporter for CNBC Television, accumulating more than 3,000 hours of live TV gallery experience. She has also delivered major outside broadcasts, including ‘Davos Today’ for the World Economic Forum annually. Jo is a keynote and Tedx speaker, as well as a qualified hatha yoga instructor.

Martin Wright, editor of the Shropshire Star, started out in journalism as a trainee reporter on the weekly County Times newspaper in 1997 covering Mid Wales. After completing his training, he joined the Shropshire Star as a senior reporter in 1998, before returning to the County Times as deputy editor 12 months later.

He went on to become editor of the Oswestry and Border Counties Advertizer  in 2001, before returning to Mid Wales as editor of the County Times. He became deputy editor of the North Wales daily, The Leader, in 2005, before being appointed associate editor of NWN Media in 2009. He left NWN in April 2013, when he took over as editor of the Shropshire Star.

The role also involves overseeing a series of eight paid-for and free weekly newspapers covering Shropshire and Mid Wales, as well as various periodicals and magazines.