Scottish Government appoints SLCC Board Members

The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) has today welcomed an announcement from the Scottish Government Cabinet Secretary for Justice, Kenny MacAskill, regarding the appointment of four new members to the SLCC. The new Members will bring the total number of Members of the Commission to nine.

The SLCC is delighted that we will be joined by two new lawyer members and two new non-lawyer members. The new lawyer members are George Clark and Ian Leitch. The new non-lawyers are Ian Gibson and Samantha Jones.

All four appointments will be for five years and will run from 1 January 2012 to 31 December 2016. They are part-time and attract a daily remuneration of £212 for a time commitment of up to six days per month. 

Mr Clark is a property and private lawyer; a practising solicitor since 1974 and a partner in Morton Fraser LLP for 31 years. He was chairman of Edinburgh Solicitors Property Centre Ltd for 13 years and a non-executive director of the Scottish Rugby Union. He is currently working as a consultant with Morton Fraser and is the Senior Independent Director of Scottish Building Society, and is chairman of its Nomination and Remuneration Committee. Mr Clark is also a member and chair of Private Rented Housing Panel.

Mr Leitch has a local government and parliamentary legal background. He recently took early retirement from his post as Assistant Clerk/Chief Executive of the Scottish Parliament. Previously he was Director of Resources and Governance at the Parliament. In local government he served as a Depute Chief Executive and council solicitor to a unitary authority. Mr Leitch also served as a Justice of the Peace for a number of years. Mr Leitch brings strong performance management skills as well as a background in public law and civic engagement experience.

Mr Gibson has wide experience in public, private and voluntary sectors. He was Regional Director of the Scottish Ambulance Service for four years and the Director of Macmillan Cancer Relief Scotland and Northern Ireland for nine years. As a board member of the Care Commission he sat on the Complaints Review Committee. He is currently a consultant for Lloyds TSB Foundation of Scotland, the independent chair of the Highland Adult Protection Committee and a board member and vice-chair of NHS Highland.

Dr Jones has a degree in Law from the London School of Economics and a Doctorate in Social-Legal Studies from the University of Oxford. Between 1992 and 2000, she worked at the Ministry of Defence and Northern Ireland Office. From 2000 until 2010, she worked at the Scottish Parliament, initially as Clerk to the Standards Committee and latterly as Programme Manager of the Parliament's HR Change Programme and Corporate Change Programme. She is currently a self employed landscape photographer with her own business on the Isle of Mull. Dr Jones is also a consultant and her most recent project was the Aros Hall Feasibility project which is jointly funded by the Scottish Government, the BIG Lottery and LEADER. Dr Jones is Chair of Mull Theatre Ltd and a Volunteer Crew Member on the Tobermory RNLI Lifeboat.