North & West Yorkshire Area Courts Board
We work in partnership with the Area Director for North & West Yorkshire to achieve effective and efficient administration of the Crown, county and magistrates’ courts.
Our role as a non-executive body is to give advice, scrutinise, review and make recommendations to encourage performance improvements to ensure the needs of court users and the local community are met.
It is not the Board’s remit to question, challenge or discuss judicial decisions.
The Board is made up of seven members who consist of two magistrates, two members from the local community, two members with knowledge or experience of the work of the courts and one member of the judiciary.
Courts Board Members
| Hilary Jane Gilbertson MBE JP (Chair) | Magistrate |
| Steven K F Chan JP | Magistrate |
| Michael Barnes | Knowledge/experience of courts |
| Peter Jeremy Furness | Knowledge/experience of courts |
| Dr Mohammed Amran | Community |
| Robert Charles Webb | Community |
| Her Honour Judge Kershaw QC |
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Hilary Gilbertson is the chairman of the North and West Yorkshire Courts Board. She is a Yorkshire farmer and works in partnership with her husband in the family business.
Her involvement with Prison Independent Monitoring Boards goes back almost 20 years, and she is a past member of the Close Supervision Centres Advisory Group.
Hilary is a Magistrate on the Selby Bench. Her interest in the magistracy also extends to being a member of the North Yorkshire Advisory Committee. She is a member of the Standards Committee of the North York Moors National Parks Authority, and an external member of the York University Psychology Department Ethics Committee.
Hilary Gilbertson (Chair)
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Steven Chan qualified as an Information Technology Professional with a degree in Computer Science and a chartered member of the British Computer Society. He is an experienced IT Management Professional with many Years of Programme and Project Management experience in the Government and Private sectors.
Steven gained a Post Graduate Diploma in Legal Practice from the College of Law after completing the Common Professional Examination.
Steven is also a General Medical Council (GMC) Fitness to Practise Panellist sitting as an adjudicator in a panel to determine cases referred by the GMC when a medical practitioner’s fitness to practice is called into question; and to impose the necessary sanction to protect the patients, the public interest and the reputation of the medical profession.
Steven Chan
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Michael Barnes has been a Solicitor in Local Government in West Yorkshire for over 25 years and he has also acted as a National Adviser to the Local Government Association. He has worked for a range of bodies including Local Council's and the Police Authority. Currently he is a Corporate Director of a Fire and Rescue Authority responsible for managing a wide range of support services in addition to his legal and governance roles. He is a Governor of a High School in Wakefield.
Michael Barnes
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Peter Furness is a Solicitor in private practice and specialises in family and criminal law, including court martial and has extensive knowledge and experience of most of the Civil and Criminal Courts within the North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire region. Mr Furness was born and educated in Yorkshire and has been a member of the Courts Board since it was established.
Peter Furness
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For thirteen years, Dr Amran has worked voluntarily in the community and has actively been involved in encouraging young people to embrace the concept of good citizenship. He has volunteered for and held numerous titles on almost 30 organisations, including Member-Cabinet Office Advisory Panel on Future builders, Member-Big Lottery Fund England Committee (Department of Culture, Media &Sport), Lay Advisor - CENTREX Developing Policing Excellence, Member- Community Safety Task Team, Member - The University Leeds Court, Member - Saathi Centre Project, Board Director - Bradford Youth Development Partnership, Chairman - Bradford and District Minority Police Liaison Committee, Member-Preventing Extremism Together Working Group.
Dr Mohammed Amran
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Robert Webb represents community interests on the Courts Board. He is currently Chief Officer of two North Yorkshire based charitable voluntary sector organisations providing services to support the elderly, the disadvantaged and people with mental health problems in the local community. He is also a Lay Member representing the Confederation of British Industry sitting on the Employment Tribunals Service based in Leeds. He retired from the North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service
in 2003 as Head of Community Fire Safety after 30 years service. He maintains an interest in fire safety matters as a senior partner in Cluderay-Webb LLP, Fire Safety Risk Assessment Specialists.
He is married with a grown up son and daughter and two young granddaughters.
Robert Charles Webb
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Her Honour Judge Kershaw QC is a law graduate of King’s College London and was called to the Bar in 1974; she practised from chambers at 6, Park Square in Leeds, taking a career break between 1983 and 1990; returning to practice in 1990 she took silk in 1998 and became Head of Chambers in 2002.
She was appointed to the North East Circuit in 2005. Judge Kershaw deals with cases in crime, family law and in the Mental Health Review Tribunal, and is a member of the North and West Yorkshire Probation Board. She is divorced with three children and her interests include riding, walking and the theatre.
Her Honour Judge Kershaw QC