Christine Banim, Operational Director

Christine joined Cafcass in November 2008 as Operational Director for the central area, and brings with her a wealth of experience in children’s services. Christine previously worked as Assistant Director in Lincolnshire and, over the past 15 years, has worked in a number of local authorities at a senior manager level. Before taking on managerial roles she worked in a specialist child protection unit for nine years and is very experienced in court work.

Julie Brown, Director of Finance

Julie joined Cafcass in 2008 having worked in both Adults and Children’s Social Care for a number of years. Prior to that she worked in the Probation Service before its national reorganisation. After qualifying as a Chartered Accountant in the early 1990’s she worked for a number of years in both practice and industry until 2001 when she switched to, and then stayed, working with the public sector.

Bruce Clark, Director of Policy

Bruce joined Cafcass in 2008 on a one year secondment from the DCFS, and in April he became Director of Policy for Cafcass. Bruce has 30 years’ experience in social work, having started his career as a volunteer worker in the Probation Service. He later worked for three local authorities as a social worker and then a social work manager and was a panel manager in Surrey. During the 12 years that he spent at the NSPCC, one of his roles was to set up the child protection helpline, which received over 170,000 calls per year. In 1999 he made the move over to central government, first at the Department of Health and then the DfES (later, DCSF). He wrote Working Together to Safeguard Children, which set out how individuals and organisations should work together to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.

Charlotte McCafferty, Director of Legal Services

Charlotte has worked with Cafcass since December 2003.  She qualified as a solicitor in 1988 and since then has worked in a variety of legal settings, including the public sector, voluntary sector and private practice.  She trained in the pre-Children Act days of wardship and has continued to specialise in children law since then.  She has published many legal articles on family law and human rights and her background includes work in education law, employment law and corporate law.  She leads the team of lawyers at Cafcass Legal and and acts as adviser to the Board and Chief Executive.

Jabbar Sardar, Director of Human Resources and Organisational Development

Jabbar joined Cafcass in October 2006 as the Head of Human Resources responsible for the HR and Health & Wellbeing functions.  In October 2009, Jabbar became the Director of Human Resources and Organisational Development.  Prior to joining Cafcass, Jabbar worked as a Senior HR Manager with Education Leeds where he was responsible for delivering a  HR service to 300 schools, 18,000 school-based staff and managing a team of HR professionals.  Prior to leaving Education Leeds, he was the interim Head of Human Resources responsible for a budget of over £10 million and a staffing compliment of 100 staff.  Jabbar has also worked as a HR professional with Leeds City Council and the University of Bradford.