Biographies
Sir David Wills Bt
Chairman
David Wills is a landowner and farmer. David’s professional interests include Blagford Properties. His community and charitable interests involve the Royal Bath & West of England Society, Bristol Cathedral Trust, Chairman of FarmLink Education Ltd, Langford Trust for Animal Health and Welfare and Bristol Care and Repair. He is a past Master of the Merchant Venturers.
Mary James MBE
Vice Chair
Since 1970 Mary has farmed in partnership with her husband Tom at Castle Farm near Bristol. They founded the Castlemere herd of pedigree Guernseys and within a few years enjoyed showing, particularly at the Royal Bath and West. They also organised visits from local schools for many years.
They established a Farm Shop in the mid eighties and combined it with dairy farming for the next decade and a half. After retiring from dairy farming they retained a small beef enterprise and other numerous diversifications.
Outside the farm Mary has had an almost lifelong involvement with Chew Valley Young Farmers Club being its first lady Chairman. She was also President of Somerset Federation for the Young Farmers Year 1992-1993.
With such an interest in the Guernsey Breed Tom and Mary joined the English Guernsey Cattle Society where Mary soon became a member of Council and Editor of their National magazine until 1986. She was also the Society President in 1992.
In 1987 Mary was persuaded to take a more active role in the NFU. After taking the chair of the North Somerset Group she was elected to the Somerset Milk Committee. In 1989 Mary had the honour of being elected Vice President of the Somerset County Branch and became its first lady Chairman in 1991. London beckoned and in 1992 Mary earned election as a Council delegate. She remained in this post until stepping down in 2000. In 1996 Mary was made Chairman of the Public Affairs Committee on the day the BSE crisis broke! Through her NFU tenure Mary was also a Director of Taste of the West for several years representing the interests of the farming industry.
The NFU has had an education for school children for many years. In the early nineties Mary was on a committee that instigated the programme where an ex-Head Teacher was employed to concentrate on getting information to school teachers with written material and numerous events. The next step was for the NFU and the Royal Agricultural Society of England (RASE) to join forces and Farm And Countryside Education (FACE) was formed.
For all her endeavors Mary was awarded the MBE in 1997 for services to agriculture and consumer affairs.
Mary is currently a trustee and vice Chair of the charity FarmLink Education Ltd. She also enjoys being Chairman of the Communications Committee of the Royal Bath and West Agricultural Society and puts in ‘an hour or two’ every week [in the season] for the National Trust at Tyntesfield House, Wraxall as a Room Interpreter.
Andrew Densham CBE
Andrew Densham is a retired solicitor. Andrew’s community and charitable interests include Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution, of which he is National Chairman, and FarmLink. He is a past Master of the Merchant Venturers.
Brian Kirkup, B.Sc., M.Ed., Dip. Ed. (Oxon)
A Northumbrian by birth, Brian Kirkup was educated at the Duke’s Grammar School, Alnwick and at the University of Leeds where he studied Chemistry. He qualified as a teacher following his post graduate studies at the University of Oxford.
He first taught at Ashington Grammar School in Northumberland, before he was appointed Head of Chemistry and then Director of Sixth Form Studies at Benfield School, a large purpose built comprehensive school in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Promotion to a Deputy Headship at Worle School in Weston-super-Mare brought him to the West Country. Whilst in this post he studied on a part-time basis at the University of Bath where he obtained a Master of Education degree in Business Management and Education.
His first Headship was at Shaftesbury School in North Dorset and his second at Churchill School in North Somerset before his retirement in 2001. He then became an Educational Consultant on a part-time basis before completely retiring in 2006.
He leads a busy life – Chairman of Cheddar Cricket Club, member of the Executive at Winscombe Rugby Club, a Rotarian, Governor at two local secondary schools, treasurer of The Gabblers Club (an after dinner speaking club for sixth form students), amateur dramatics, music and photography – as well as enjoying travelling and family life with his wife Jennifer in Cheddar.
John Alvis MBE
John Alvis is Managing Director of the family owned Alvis Bros Ltd which is a Farming Company based in North Somerset. The business produces 3500 tonnes of Cheese, two thirds of which is ‘Organic’ along with 100 tonnes of whey cream and butter. There is a strong emphasis on quality assurance and traceability which supports a wide customer profile including some of the High Street multiples as well as the Farmshop.
The farms cover more than 4000 acres with 1000 milking cows, 250 of which are ‘Organic’, supplying 8.0 million litres of milk p.a. to the Cheese Dairy. In addition there are beef, arable, pig and contracting enterprises.
John is the founder of FarmLink.
Mark Pooley, FCA
Mark trained with Hollingdales, qualifying as a Chartered Accountant in 1994. He worked as a manager for Hollingdales and Kidsons Impey until 1998. His portfolio of clients included charities and owner managed businesses.
In 1998 Mark set up, together with a colleague, a successful firm McEwen & Pooley that provided accountancy and taxation services to local charities and businesses. On the retirement of Mark’s business partner in early 2004, McEwen & Pooley merged with The John Hollingdale Partnership to become Hollingdale Pooley.
Mark has developed a strong understanding of the accountancy, audit and taxation issues facing organisations and individuals. His areas of expertise include Charities, Owner managed businesses, Trust tax and Inheritance tax planning.
Farmlink Staff
Diana Redfern
After a 46 year career teaching Geography and Environmental Studies Diana Redfern has recently retired from Churchill Community School in North Somerset. She was Head of House from 1970 to 1995 and for 10 years ran the school farm. At home she runs a smallholding keeping a variety of animals, growing organic fruit and vegetables and also keeps bees. Combined with her smallholding her main interests are natural history, a love of outdoor life and the conservation of the environment.
Over the last two years Diana has completed a fascinating and rigorous course culminating in the award of Certificate of Wildlife Biology from the University of Bristol. The course included topics such as environmental assessment, environmental law, computer studies, ecology, conservation techniques plus the study of mammals, birds, invertebrate, plants, amphibians, freshwater and marine biology. Diane has also gained the Royal Horticultural Society General and Advanced Certificate in Horticulture and now runs various practical workshops.
As well as her garden being an absorbing interest her other main interest is as a Parish Wildlife Warden for the North Somerset Council, which basically is to be watchful in the parish for ‘problems’ concerning the general environment and to be a point of contact for people who need help or advice on environmental issues.
Upon retirement Diane said she wanted to continue working with young people and FarmLink would provide the opportunity. Her extensive teaching experience, ability to relate to students and love of the countryside makes her an ideal complement to Farmer Nick helping deliver lessons at the same time formalising the lesson plans included in the FarmLink programme.
Nick Baker
Nick was born in Surrey and moved with his parents in 1959 to Somerset when his father became a teacher at Wedmore School. After leaving school and working for a short time on a local farm Nick joined the London Fire Brigade. After the fire brigade Nick was a tree feller for three years before joining Alvis Bros in 1975. He was given the responsibility of managing all the youngstock for the dairy herds. The role developed until in 1981 he was made manager of the newly purchased Lower Stock Farm and given responsibility for all the cattle, 250 acres and all that went with it.
Nick managed to combine first class cattle management with conservation and won a number of awards for demonstrating the ability to farm commercially in tandem with conserving the environment. Nick held one of the first Countryside Stewardship Agreements for a lowland grass farm in the country and as a consequence started to be asked to host visiting groups.
In the late 1990’s Nick was given the opportunity to take early retirement from practical farming and took on a full time educational role within Alvis Bros. In the years since, Nick has had contact with tens of thousands of school children both in and out of school and is known to his legions of followers as ‘Farmer Nick’.
Nick Green
Nick’s ‘daytime job’ is Farm Operations Director for Alvis Bros. Having started off as ‘the boy’ in 1982 on one of the dairy farms he is now responsible for the business’ three dairy farms, beef, arable, pig and contracting enterprises and looks after the non farming estate as well.
He has had various involvements away from the business including national Chairman of the Institute of Agricultural Management, Chairman of the Somerset Centre of Management in Agriculture, regional Chairman of the National Pig Association and Director of Meat South West. He was the instigator of the North Somerset Agricultural Society’s Meal Wheel and has worked closely with FACE and SW CoRE to deliver the Year of Food and Farming in the South West.
Simon Phillips
Simon Phillips followed a 25 year farm management career with a spell as a forage specialist before recently qualifying as a lecturer in Further Education. He now combines teaching land based studies and numeracy at Bridgwater College with part time administration of FarmLink. His experience hosting numerous farm visits when managing the farm and being married to a primary school teacher makes him well aware of the national curriculum and how FarmLink can help deliver strands in an exciting innovative way outside of the classroom.