David Dickman
Head of Co-operative and Sector Development, The Co-operative Bank

David Dickman has worked in co-operative banking for more than 40 years. His earliest strategic roles for The Co-operative Bank included forming its first training departments and the development and expansion of a specialist building and finance section.

During a four-year secondment, David was an Executive Director and the Head of Operations at Unity Trust Bank and later became Head of the Manchester Business Centre.

In 1998, David took over as part time chief executive of the UK Co-operative Council and currently sits on the CBI’s North West regional council.

David is Chair of the Community Loan Fund for the North West, was a Supporters Trust founder member and is a board member for the Local Investment Fund. He is actively involved with a range of community interest support groups.

Andrew Hibbert
Development Manager and Loans Officer, Industrial Common Ownership Finance Ltd.

Andrew Hibbert has served on the Management Group of Co-operative Action since inception and has been Development Manager and Loans Officer for Industrial Common Ownership Finance Ltd (ICOF) for 5 years. ICOF has been providing loan finance to co-operatives and social enterprises for 30 years, and loan management services for other lenders, including Co-operative Action, for 10 years. Prior to his present job Andrew was the Operations Manager for ICOF, having joined as a Loans Officer in 1997. He therefore has experience of running a Community Development Finance Initiative (CDFI) at every level.

Before joining ICOF Andrew was founder and general manager of the Daily Bread Co-operative in Cambridge, a highly successful business which employs people with mental illness. It pays real wages, makes real profits and receives no grant support, on a turnover of just under £2 million. Andrew is also a board member of the London Rebuilding Society and the Social Enterprise Coalition.

Spencer Neal
Publisher, New Statesman

Spencer Neal has managed Britain's premier current-affairs weekly since May 1997. He has been responsible for many of the publication's partnerships and is especially interested in opportunities that challenge social exclusion. Spencer lives in Hackney, north London, with his partner and their two young children.

Dr Jessica Rafinski
Assistant Director, Social Enterprise Unit, Department of Trade and Industry

Jessica joined the Social Enterprise Unit, at the DTI in September 2002 to help take forward work to implement the government’s strategy for social enterprise. She has particular responsibility for the strand of work dedicated to promoting understanding of social enterprise and demonstrating its value.

Jessica has worked at the DTI for around four years, enjoying responsibility through that time for developing policy on recycling of packaging, economic reform and, more recently, rights for parents to take paid time off work. She graduated from Imperial College in 1999 with a PhD in environmental electrochemistry after completing a first degree in environmental chemistry at Lancaster University.

Rowena Young
Chief Executive, School for Social Entrepreneurs

Rowena joined the School for Social Entrepreneurs in September 2002 after the experience of working in a range of distinctive social enterprises. She believes social entrepreneurs not only yield impressive practical returns on our investments, but that they play a crucial role in society by changing the way we can and do plan for the future.

Her last role as Development Director at the Kaleidoscope Project, Kingston enabled her to launch a social business providing training in work for long-term and highly marginalised drug users and to launch a state-of-the-art learning and rehabilitation centre.

Rowena is a commissioner on the JRF Inquiry into Drug Testing at Work and sits on the steering group of Forward Thinking on Drugs – an evidence-based campaign to influence the UN conventions. She has been a trustee of Children’s Express since 2001.