DanceEast welcomes new chairman

Mr Rose took up his post on April 21 and is looking forward to leading DanceEast through the next stages of visionary development in the new Jerwood DanceHouse.

He and his wife Pippa have been supporting DanceEast for many years.

He qualified as a barrister before forming a corporate finance boutique specialising in refinancing and restructuring smaller companies in 1975.

At the age of 34 he became chairman of his first publicly listed company and has, since that time, been chairman of over 25 public and private companies.

At present he is chairman of six companies within print software, online academic research, household products manufacture, fine art, engineering and financial services. These are all companies he has either co-founded or joined at an early stage to develop the businesses.

In July 2007, Mr Rose was appointed co-chair, with Michael Gove, of the National Citizen Service programme for 16-year-olds, one of David Cameron’s key manifesto initiatives.

In April 2009, he was asked to be co-chair with Theresa May of the Get Britain Working policy group led by Lord David Freud.

In December 2009 he co-founded the Big Society policy initiative and became senior adviser to the New Schools Network, a policy close to Michael Gove, the Education Secretary.

He takes on the role following the death of James Hehir at the end of 2009 from interim chair Lyn Goleby.

The DanceEast board also welcomes new members Anthony Hilton, Financial Editor of the Evening Standard, Anne Gordon, financial director at MSC, Brendan Keaney, director of Greenwich Dance, and Fred Goetzen, director of communications (UK) at Tiffanys.

n THE East Anglia office of mid-tier accountancy and business advisory firm Baker Tilly is boosting its personal tax offering with the appointment of Fenella Martin-Redman as partner and head of the private client team.

Ms Martin-Redman joins after 14 years at the Cambridge office of Price Bailey and her role will cover all areas of personal taxation, with particular emphasis on providing solutions for directors and shareholders of family-owned businesses, high net worth individuals, non-domiciles and tax planning for separation and divorce.

n ANNE Wright, Tax Manager at Ensors Chartered Accountants, was one of only 20 tax practitioners and five senior HMRC officials personally invited to attend a round table discussion at Number 11 Downing Street recently.

The discussion was facilitated by then Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Timms, and focused on tax issues for the SME community. HMRC’s business tax focus has recently been on large business and they now wanted to do the same for smaller businesses.

In preparation for the discussion, a series of questions were distributed to the tax practitioners. These focused on finding out what the tax practitioners, and the businesses they act for, thought about the service they currently received from HMRC, how it could be improved and what might be introduced to make the service better.

Areas where HMRC received praise included the Business Payment Support Service, dedicated and specialist helplines and the new agent account managers.

Ms Wright, the only invitee from the East Anglia region, said: “I was very honoured to receive the invitation to attend this event. It is the first time this sort of discussion has taken place and it was refreshing to be asked our views.”

n IPSWICH Building Society has presented its annual employee award for outstanding customer service to Lisa Last, who works at the society’s head office in Ipswich.

Ms Last joined the Society four years ago after initially being offered a one year contract in the mortgage processing department. She won promotion for her positive attitude to customer service and is now a senior assistant liaising with mortgage brokers and independent financial advisers to ensure mortgage deals are completed to their total satisfaction.

She has also been selected for the Achievers Academy, an in depth training programme for high fliers run by Ipswich Building Society in conjunction with six other building societies.

“I love what I do, which is treating people the way I’d want to be treated myself. It’s an approach which is at the heart of what Ipswich Building Society is about,” she said.

n DEBS Brown from Panfield in Essex, is celebrating after scooping an accolade at a national event for her outstanding sales contribution to TV chef Jamie Oliver’s latest business venture, Jamie at Home.

Mr Oliver hand-picked Ms Brown, 34, who was among the top in the country for her sales achievements, for her part in making his thriving direct-sales business a success.

In her own successful Jamie at Home business, she now manages a team of 200 consultants in the Essex area.

Ms Brown said: “It’s a great pleasure to work in partnership with Jamie. He approaches everything with such passion and he has definitely inspired me to run my business in this way.”

She is now one of more than 2,700 Consultants nationwide.

n ESTATE agents Savills’ East Anglian rural property team has welcomed a new member of staff to its agribusiness division.

Ben Makowiecki joins from HSBC and will work primarily in the Cambridge office with Peter Bennett and Giles Hanglin, along with the regional teams across Norfolk, Suffolk and East Anglia.

Mr Makowiecki joins Savills from HSBC Agriculture where he worked for five years as a relationship manager responsible for approximately 120 farming businesses in Essex and Hertfordshire. Prior to this he spent five years with Andersons as an agricultural business consultant and has over seven years practical consultancy experience.

Mr Makowiecki lives in Eye with his wife and two children, is chairman of the Mid-Anglia branch of the Institute of Agricultural Management and a member of both the Essex Agricultural Society and Suffolk Agricultural Association.