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TRUSTEES

Carole Johnson

Chair

Shoba Ram

Trustee

Debra Newrick

Trustee

Alice Clermont

Trustee

Bonny Chung

Vice Chair

Liz Potter

Trustee

Lakhraj Minhas

Trustee

Hannah Stapley-Parker

Trustee

Shruthi Venkatachalam

Trustee

Elahe Karimnia

Trustee

Sophie Peart

Trustee

Emily Johnstone

Trustee

Libby Watson

Trustee

Head and shoulders shot of Clare

Clare Meraz

Trustee

STAFF

Katy Taylor

Director

Dahlia Von Carolath

Community organiser

Faith Barorot

Community Development Worker

Claire Charras

Communications Coordinator

Willow Vidal-Hall

Young Women's Worker, Communities & Connections Coordinator

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  • St Paul's Learning Centre
    94 Grosvenor Rd
    Bristol
    BS2 8XJ
  • 07796 433663
  • info@bristolwomensvoice.org.uk
Registered Charity No. 1170110
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© 2024 Bristol Women’s Voice, all rights reserved

Carole Johnson

Co-chair

Please check back soon for a full bio.

Shoba RAM

Trustee

Shoba joined the BWV board in January 2024. Shoba Ram is an experienced leader in drug policy, with over two decades of experience working within drug treatment services and the criminal justice system to improve services for those most affected by drug policy.

Shoba brings a strong commitment to reducing the harm and discrimination associated with outdated drug policies. She brings a particular commitment to improving services for women, especially in the context of problematic substance use.

As a trustee of Bristol Women’s Voice and Director of the Women’s Work Lab, she has advocated for and shaped gender-specific services to support women to receive necessary care and support.

Debra Newrick

Trustee

Debra joined the board in September 2024. Debra has worked in community development roles for 25 years, supporting marginalised individuals and communities to reach their personal potential through consultation, research, delivery design project management. She has project-managed gender research and trained local diverse women, to capture women’s barriers and amplify women’s voices to support change.

Debra is a qualified executive leadership coach and member of the European Mentoring & Coaching Council, which enables her to ensure that she has continuous professional development to enhance the coaching journey.

Debra has a vast portfolio and her core values are change-making and inclusion, she is a Fellow of Royal Society of Commerce and Arts which enables her to connect with change-makers worldwide, to develop initiatives to design and sustain change.

Alice Clermont

Trustee

Alice joined Bristol Women’s Voice as a Trustee in 2021, having previously worked with the charity for her Masters dissertation about engaging marginalised women in the policy-making process.

She is passionate about empowering women to speak and be heard, especially those who are least represented when decisions are made.

She works in policy at Sustrans, focusing on equity and inclusion to improve walking, wheeling and cycling for everyone. She is also part of Bristol Women’s Commission Health Task Group, collaborating to influence gendered health priorities across the city.

Bonny Chung

Vice Chair

Bonny joined Bristol Women’s Voice in September 2021 and became vice-Chair in February 2022.

Prior to this, she was Secretary and Deputy Chair of the Driver Vehicle Standards Agency’s (DVSA) Women’s Network where her portfolio focused on period poverty, raising awareness of domestic abuse and launching the menopause charter.

Since taking up the Vice Chair role, she have published an article to raise awareness of Menstrual Hygiene Day, focused on developing BWV’s board culture, and produced a central repository of key diversity dates and board meetings to ensure the Board operates more efficiently.

Outside of BWV, Bonny is a Civil Service delivering much needed funds to North West towns for regeneration and local growth projects. She is involved in a number of Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion networks, which strives to improve outcomes for under-represented groups and promote development opportunities for all.

Liz Potter

Trustee

Liz joined the board of trustees for Bristol Women’s Voice in 2021.

Liz is a change management professional and works on large transformation programmes. She is committed to belonging and inclusion and being a voice for positive change in this space.

Lakhraj Minhas

Trustee

Lakhraj joined the board in September 2024. Lakhraj Minhas is an experienced sustainability professional and lawyer, with her last role being Group Director of Sustainability at a healthcare recruitment and services company.

Responsible, inclusive and sustainable practices are core to what drives Lakhraj to build and embed ethical decision making, environmental responsibility and create fairer, more inclusive organisations. With experience ranging across central and local government, charitable and corporate sectors, Lakhraj has delivered positive outcomes through building multi-stakeholder partnerships, programme management, governance and delivery and designing processes and frameworks to support change.

Her voluntary work includes encouraging learning and engagement with the natural world as a learning facilitator at the Natural History Museum, acting as a trustee and company secretary for a health and wellbeing charity supporting marginalised women and mentoring ex-care leavers to support their career progression.

Hannah Stapley-Parker

Trustee

Hannah joined the team in 2022, driven by a surplus of “feminist energy” and a desire to contribute more of her time to feminist causes.

Born and raised in Bristol, she’s become an active member of the city’s women’s sector, beginning as a trustee with Bristol Women’s Voice.

As a brand and communications leader, she also brings us expertise in that area. She’s an active voice for equality in corporate spaces and additionally, she leads a volunteer team specialising in inclusive communications, supporting other women’s charities in Bristol.

Shruthi Venkatachalam

Trustee

Shruthi joined the board in August 2023. She recently completed her doctoral studies at the Centre for Gender and Violence Research, School for Policy Studies, University of Bristol.

Her research primarily revolves around feminist disability studies, violence against women, human rights, and theories of power and justice.

She is a professional social worker with experience in various adult and child social care roles in India.

Additionally, she serves as a practitioner coach for value-based leadership training and conducts legal awareness sessions on disability rights and sexuality education for girls with disabilities.

She has also collaborated in creating a training module on disability and disaster risk reduction, with a specific focus on children and adults with disabilities.

Elahe Karimnia

Trustee

Elahe joined Bristol Women’s Voice’s board in September 2023. She is a researcher and lecturer in Architecture and Planning at UWE Bristol, with special interest in designing publicness and inclusive places.

She is passionate about intersectional feminism and the use of creative methods in challenging different forms of exclusions and discriminations against marginalised bodies in the built environment.

Having a keen eye for design and a deep commitment to social justice, Elahe is interested in improving the quality of public spaces and infrastructure for women in cities.

Sophie Peart

Trustee

Sophie joined the board in August 2023 and works for Southmead Hospital Charity as the individual giving officer.

She’s also worked in the civil service and for the Harbour Project, a small charity in Swindon which supports refugees and those seeking asylum. It was there that she gained an interest and experience in shaping an inclusive, safe and thriving space for women.

In addition, she studied German and Spanish at the University of Nottingham and completed her Master’s in Identity and Integration at the University of Amsterdam.

Emily Johnstone

Trustee

Emily joined BWV in October 2022. She is a specialist medical negligence solicitor, with a particular focus on women’s health, birth injuries and gynaecological cancers.

She is passionate about improving diversity in the legal profession and has mentored for several university accessibility schemes.

Emily is interested in improving healthcare inequalities faced by women, especially those from marginalised groups.

Libby Watson

Trustee

Joining Bristol Women’s Voice is Libby’s first experience of being a Trustee or in a non-executive role, but it is one that she is hugely excited about. She’s previously volunteered with many charities, including at Horseworld Trust, Marmalade Trust and Avon and Somerset Police as a Special Constable, and continues to volunteer with Re-Engage as a Tea Party Coordinator and driver.

Libby has been a Civil Servant for the past six years, and while in her role founded, and for four years chaired, the Gender Equality Network in her organisation. Libby has also worked in healthcare research in the NHS, and at a corporate dental company. She is really passionate about inclusion and diversity, Gender Equality, and improving the lives of women and girls in Bristol. 

Head and shoulders shot of Clare

Clare Meraz

Co-chair

Claire first joined Bristol Women’s Voice in 2017 and became co-Chair in 2021. She has previously been a Trustee for Oxfordshire Rape Crisis Centre and Survivors UK, and is passionate about many social and environmental issues, but particularly ending violence against women and girls.

Since taking up the Chair role, she has focused on developing our board culture, building on the legacy of our previous Chair and developing open and honest feedback and debate amongst Trustees.

The board consists of a diverse group of women who have a range of different backgrounds, views and opinions, and do not always agree – diversity of thought usually leads to better decisions and is welcome, as long as conversations are respectful of others.

Outside of BWV, Claire is a HR professional and have worked in several HR roles in the public sector. She has a PhD in American History that looked at gender and community organising in the African American freedom struggle, as well as a Masters in Human Resource Management and an MBA. 

Katy Taylor

Director

Katy joined BWV in November 2020. She has worked in the violence against women & girls sector for 15+ years in practitioner, leadership and consultancy roles. She continues to provide independent consultancy in the specialist women’s sector. 

Dahlia Von Carolath

Community organiser, Women Together for Change

Dahlia joined BWV in January 2022. She has background in grassroot movement building and community organising, immigration law, refugee support and protection. She is a mother of two boys, is passionate about women’s rights, system change and earth protection.

Faith Barorot

Community Development Worker

Faith Joined Bristol Women’s Voice in February 2024. Originally from Kenya, Faith recently completed her Masters in Gender and International Relations from the University of Bristol.

Previously, she was working as a management consultant in gender-focused projects across Sub-Saharan Africa. Faith is excited to utilise a bottom-up approach to enhance women’s livelihoods, especially marginalised women.

Claire Charras

Communications Coordinator

Claire joined Bristol Women’s Voice in July 2023.  She has been working in communications for the charity sector since 2012 and has been living in Bristol since 2013.