Three senior figures with a passion for the charity sector have been appointed to the board of trustees at the Charity Commission.
The men, who specialise in growth capital provision, banking and charity leadership, will serve for three years from 27 March 2023.
They are:
Rory Brooks CBE
Brooks spent 13 years in banking in the US and London before, in 1988, founding what is now MML Capital, a leading European mid-market growth capital provider. He stepped down as chair in 2023.
Brooks and his wife Elizabeth, who have two adult children and live in West London, established their family philanthropic foundation in 2005 with a focus on social disadvantage, education and the arts.
He was chair of the philanthropic board of Manchester University for 10 years, hosted poverty summits in South Africa, and has served as trustee and/or chair of The Centre for Social Justice, IntoUniversity and Quintessentially Foundation.
Shrenik Davda
Davda has almost 40 years of banking experience in the Central Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa region, helping to build market-leading franchises for prominent global financial institutions such as JP Morgan and Deutsche Bank.
In addition to his executive banking roles, Davda has served as a trustee for three charities focused on orphan support in East Africa; humanitarian aid for refugees in the Middle East; and girls’ education in Kenya.
He is an independent member of the supervisory board of Nova Ljubljanska Banka and serves on the supervisory board of Ukrgasbank, a leading Ukrainian bank.
In 2022 Davda was appointed as a lay member of the board of IPSO, the independent regulator of the newspaper and magazine industry in the UK.
Mark Simms
Simms is the chief executive of the charity P3, with more than 25 years of experience in the voluntary sector.
He first worked in mental health nursing, then in various roles within the charity sector, including fundraising, project management and advocacy.
SImms has served for much of his career as a non-executive director or trustee of many independent charities, large and small. His current portfolio includes:
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Trustee of Homeless Link
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Non-executive director of New Leaf, a social enterprise run for and by people who have been in prison
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Non-executive director of The Big Issue Invest
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Advisor to the chief executive of Big Society Capital
Board members of the Charity Commission receive £350 a day for approximately 24 days’ work a year.
The appointments process is regulated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments.
Under the Code, any significant political activity undertaken by an appointee in the past five years must be declared.
This is defined as including holding office, public speaking, making a recordable donation, or candidature for election.
Davda and Simms have not declared any significant political activity. Brooks has declared financial donations to the Conservative and Unionist Party, recorded on the Electoral Commission.