Anchor Board

Christopher Kemball
Independent Non-Executive Chair of the Board and Chair of the Nominations Committee

Christopher joined Anchor as Chair in November 2019. He has served as a non-executive director on the boards of, and chaired, several publicly listed and private equity owned companies in the financial, business services and healthcare sectors. Before then he worked in the United States and Europe as a senior M&A and corporate finance advisor.

He is currently Chair of St Elizabeth's Centre, an independent charitable trust which supports vulnerable children, young people and adults with epilepsy and other complex medical conditions and Non-Executive Director and   founder   shareholder  of Wren Investment Office Limited, a multi-family office wealth adviser. 

Christopher served with the British Army for seven years after graduating from Cambridge University with a BA Hons in Law.

 

Elizabeth Froude
Independent Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Investment and Development Committee

Elizabeth has been in the Housing Sector for almost 20 years and worked for large and complex organisations in several geographical areas of England. She is currently Group Chief Executive at Platform, who operate coast to coast through the midlands.

Prior to coming into Housing she worked for several large FTSE organisations both in the UK, USA and across Europe in roles particularly focussed in change and performance improvement, often in M&A environments.

She is a strong supporter of the sustainability agenda for the sector and is the Chair of National Housing Federation Sustainability Strategy Group and also on the Board of the Future Homes Hub, who do research to support policy development on future housing standards in the new build environment.

 

Nicola Bruce
Senior Independent Director and Chair of the Remuneration Committee

Nicola is an experienced strategist and former FTSE 250 Exco member with a strong corporate governance background in regulated markets. She is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants.

Nicola is currently Remuneration Committee Chair at Stelrad plc,   MJ Gleeson plc and Ibstock plc. She is also  a Non-Executive Director for OFWAT, the economic regulator for the water sector in England and Wales. 

Nicola was previously a Partner at the strategy consultancy Monitor (now Monitor Deloittes). Prior to this she worked as an economist for Coopers & Lybrand, leading economic development and regeneration strategies for UK regions.

Nicola has an MA (PPE) from Oxford University and an MBA from INSEAD. Nicola joined the Board in 2019 and became Anchor's Senior Independent Director in January 2021.

 

Mike Green
Independent Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee

Mike is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. 

His career commenced at KPMG as a trainee accountant where he progressed to the role of Senior Manager during his 11 years’ service. Mike then spent 20 years in broadcast television, his last role being Deputy Group Finance Director at ITV plc. He was the independent member of Metropolitan Housing Trust’s Audit Committee from 2009 and from 2012 to 2017 he was Non-Executive Director and Chair of Metropolitan’s Audit and Risk Committee.

He was, for 10 years, a Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Audit Committee of Southend University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. Mike currently has other non-executive roles with the Government Legal Department, where he chairs the Audit and Risk Assurance Committee and the Royal Television Society.

 

Peter Hay CBE
Independent Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Service Quality Committee

Peter has over 20 years’ experience as a national and local leader of social care and public sector services. He has a track record of improving social care services and significant experience of improving performance, culture, delivering efficiencies in services and building confidence within the workforce.

Peter retired from Birmingham City Council after 14 years’ service, during which he held a number of strategic roles. Most recently he was Strategic Director for People, responsible for adult and children’s social care, education, public health, housing support and commissioning, before which he was Strategic Director for Social Care and Health and Strategic Director for Adults and Communities.

He was Director of Social Services for North East Lincolnshire Council and previously has had a range of social work and management positions within Humberside and North East Lincolnshire.

Peter is a board member at Longhurst Housing and chair of Turning Point England. He also serves as National Executive Member and Treasurer of the New NHS Alliance. He has a degree in Social Work and an MBA and is a Visiting Lecturer at Birmingham City University.

 

Denise Peart
Independent Non-Executive Director

Denise brings over 25 years’ business experience and knowledge gained in senior leadership positions including Chief Talent and Diversity Officer at Sky and Global Talent Director at The Coca-Cola Company based in Atlanta, GA. In addition, she has worked at the helm of the HR functions for high-profile, consumer facing organisations undergoing significant change, such as Tesco, GE, BP and M&S. 

Denise is skilled at creating and implementing, commercial HR strategies that build organisational capability to deliver strategy, sustainable shareholder value and competitive advantage. She has extensive experience of creating and embedding innovative people practices by developing compelling cases for change, enabling business performance, accelerating transformation and shaping organisational culture to enable growth. This winning combination of commercial acumen, strategy and operational leadership has allowed her to contribute substantially across complex, broad business agendas. 

Denise holds a MA in Human Resource Management, BA(Hons) in English Literature and Philosophy, and is a fellow of the CIPD.

 

Katy Taylor
Independent Non-Executive Director

Katy joined Southern Water in August 2021 as Chief Customer Officer.

Previously Katy was Chief Strategy and Customer Officer at Go- Ahead, the FTSE 250 international passenger transport business. 

Katy has held director-level roles in financial services, media and professional services including Kroll, VTB Bank and IG Group, focussing on digital retailing, reputation, marketing and customer experience.

Katy joined Anchor's Board in 2020 as a Non-Executive Director. She is also a Board Governor at Kingston University, and Advisory Board member at micro-donation charity Pennies. She is a founding member of the Business in the Community Place initiative. 

 

Peter Truscott
Independent Non-Executive Director

Peter is Group Chief Executive of Crest Nicholson and was formerly Group Chief Executive of Galliford Try plc.

Peter worked at Taylor Wimpey plc for over 30 years where he was Divisional Chair for 11 years and was responsible for the Spanish business and served as a member of the Executive Committee.

Peter previously worked for CALA Homes as Area Land Director, South.

 

 

 

 

Fred Angole
Independent Non-Executive Director

Fred is currently a non-executive board member and Chair of the Audit & Risk Committee at Notting Hill Genesis Housing Association and holds a similar position at Newlon Housing Trust.  

He is also Finance Director and Deputy Chief Executive of YMCA St Paul’s Group, a supported housing provider that specialises in providing accommodation and wellbeing services to vulnerable young Londoners.

Fred is a qualified accountant with over 30 years’ experience in the social housing sector, as a regulator, finance executive and non-executive director.  He is a fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants and has an MSc in Finance & Investment.  

He was previously Director of Corporate Services at Homes for Haringey and a trustee of Black Cultural Archives.

 

Sarah Jones
Chief Executive

Sarah joined Anchor as Finance Director in September 2014 and was appointed Chief Executive in 2022. She is a Chartered Management Accountant and has held a variety of senior finance roles across large corporate and private equity businesses years.

Sarah is a Non-Executive Director and Chair of Audit & Risk for Chelmer Housing Partnership, a charitable housing association based in Essex.

 

 

 

Amanda Holgate
Chief Financial Officer

Amanda Holgate joined Anchor in February 2023 and became a Board member on 23 May 2023. Amanda is accountable for ensuring that Anchor is a sustainable organisation with the financial resources needed to meet our commitments to existing customers, deliver value for money to all stakeholders, to finance the development of new services and approaches, and manage risk.

Amanda has worked in the housing sector for more than eight years, first as Deputy Finance Director at Family Mosaic and then as Director, Finance Services at Peabody.

She joined Southern Housing Group as Chief Financial Officer in 2019 and became Anchor’s CFO in February 2023. Amanda is a Board Trustee and the Chair of Audit and Risk Committee at Centrepoint, a youth homelessness charity.

Prior to entering the housing sector she gained more than 20 years’ financial and commercial experience in a range of sectors including financial services, technology and retail asset management.