Chair
Baroness Anne Longfield CBE
Baroness Longfield’s commitment to leading this Inquiry stems from her longstanding determination to protect the most vulnerable children and to hold services to account when they fail.
She has spent her career challenging the systems that overlook at-risk young people, and she brings a clear resolve to uncover what went wrong, amplify victims’ voices, and push for real change so that exploitation is prevented – not repeated.
Baroness Longfield has been a strong, independent advocate and policy expert for children for more than four decades. She was appointed as a life peer in December 2024 and introduced to the House of Lords in February 2025.
In 2015, she was appointed as the independent Children’s Commissioner for England. During her six-year term, she campaigned for children on a range of issues, including the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and improving support for the most vulnerable children and young people.
In 2021, she established and chaired the Commission on Young Lives, an independent inquiry developing proposals to protect vulnerable teenagers from harm and exploitation.
In 2023, she founded the Centre for Young Lives, an independent think tank focused on improving outcomes for children, young people, and families.
Earlier in her career, she led a national children’s charity delivering children’s centres across the country and worked with the government on the development of the Sure Start programme.
Panellist
Zoë Billingham CBE
Baroness Longfield’s commitment to leading this Inquiry stems from her longstanding determination to protect the most vulnerable children and to hold services to account when they fail.
She has spent her career challenging the systems that overlook at-risk young people, and she brings a clear resolve to uncover what went wrong, amplify victims’ voices, and push for real change so that exploitation is prevented – not repeated.
Baroness Longfield has been a strong, independent advocate and policy expert for children for more than four decades. She was appointed as a life peer in December 2024 and introduced to the House of Lords in February 2025.
In 2015, she was appointed as the independent Children’s Commissioner for England. During her six-year term, she campaigned for children on a range of issues, including the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and improving support for the most vulnerable children and young people.
In 2021, she established and chaired the Commission on Young Lives, an independent inquiry developing proposals to protect vulnerable teenagers from harm and exploitation.
In 2023, she founded the Centre for Young Lives, an independent think tank focused on improving outcomes for children, young people, and families.
Earlier in her career, she led a national children’s charity delivering children’s centres across the country and worked with the government on the development of the Sure Start programme.
Panellist
Eleanor Kelly CBE
Eleanor Kelly brings decades of experience tackling some of the country’s most complex public sector challenges. Her work has been defined by a calm, principled focus on accountability and public protection.
She has repeatedly been called on to lead major responses during moments of national crisis, ensuring that systems learn from failure and that communities are not let down again.
Her role in the Inquiry reflects that same commitment to uncovering the truth, strengthening public institutions, and ensuring vulnerable people receive the protection they deserve.
Eleanor has almost five decades of experience in local government and finance, including a period at KPMG.
She served as Chief Executive of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets from 1999 to 2002, before becoming Chief Executive of Southwark Council, a role she held for over a decade until 2022.
During her career she has led major national responses, including as joint lead on the Grenfell Tower taskforce and as local authority adviser on the COVID-19 National Vaccination Programme.
She was awarded an honorary fellowship of King’s College London in 2022 for services to society.
Legal Team
The legal team supports the Chair in conducting the Inquiry’s proceedings, gathering evidence, and ensuring the process is fair and thorough.
Solicitor to the Inquiry
Zaqia Rashid
Zaqia Rashid brings extensive experience leading complex and high-profile public inquiries, with a particular focus on public law and national security matters.
She is recognised as a leading practitioner in this field and has worked on some of the most significant inquiries in recent years, including the Covid-19 Inquiry, Infected Blood Inquiry, Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, and Undercover Policing Inquiry, where she also served as Solicitor to the Inquiry.
Zaqia has a strong track record of delivering inquiry work at scale and pace, providing strategic leadership across multidisciplinary teams and stakeholders. She has led the development of governance structures, systems and protocols to ensure inquiries are conducted lawfully, proportionately and effectively.
Her approach is trauma-informed, reflecting specialist training, and she is known for handling complex and sensitive issues with rigour, fairness and independence, particularly where a wide range of perspectives and communities are involved.
Counsel to the Inquiry
Fiona Scolding KC
Fiona Scolding KC is a highly respected silk with nearly three decades of experience specialising in the law relating to children, young people and vulnerable adults.
Her practice spans education, healthcare, community care and equality law, and she has acted extensively on behalf of looked-after children, care leavers, and young people with disabilities and special educational needs. Throughout her career, she has used the law to drive improvements in policy and practice to better protect vulnerable groups.
Fiona has played a leading role in some of the most significant public inquiries in recent years. At the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, she served as lead counsel to major investigations into the Anglican Church, schools and religious organisations, contributing to multiple key reports between 2019 and 2022.
She has also represented 297 individuals, alongside The Hepatitis C Trust, in the Infected Blood Inquiry, focusing on complex systemic issues across healthcare and government. In addition, she has conducted independent reviews on patient safety, governance and safeguarding, including peer-on-peer sexual abuse in education settings and workplace harassment.
Fiona was a member of the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s panel of counsel for 20 years and brings judicial experience alongside her inquiry work.
Counsel to the Inquiry
Julian Blake
Julian Blake is a barrister at 11KBW with extensive experience in public inquiries and investigations, particularly in holding public authorities, companies and individuals to account.
He most recently acted as Counsel to the Inquiry in the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry and the Nottingham Inquiry and has represented core participants in a number of major inquiries, including the Covid-19 Inquiry, Grenfell Tower Inquiry and Infected Blood Inquiry.
Julian began his career prosecuting and defending criminal cases and has significant experience in matters involving policing, the Crown Prosecution Service and serious organised crime. He has also served on the Attorney General’s civil panels.
Secretariat
The Secretariat is responsible for the administration of the Inquiry. This involves supporting the Chair and Panel, who make the key decisions. The Secretariat acts as the main point of contact between the Inquiry and the Home Office, and works to ensure the Chair, Panel, and the Inquiry’s work remains independent from Government.
Joint Chief Executives and Secretaries
Sally Frazer and Alice Bradley
As Joint Chief Executives and Secretaries to the Inquiry, Alice and Sally are responsible for the day-to-day running of the Inquiry, including leading the Inquiry team. They report to the Chair and Panel and work to support them in whatever way is needed to complete the Inquiry’s work.
Alice and Sally are senior civil servants who have worked together in a job-share across a range of senior leadership roles over the past seven years. Most recently, they served as joint Chief Executive of the Leasehold Advisory Service.
They have led teams on a number of significant areas of government work, including local government Brexit preparedness, the local government COVID-19 response, and housing delivery roles at both the Greater London Authority and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).
They also led the well-received Homes England Public Bodies Review in 2023.
Between them, Alice and Sally have over 20 years of civil service experience each, spanning local government, homelessness, and social housing, as well as working directly in Ministerial teams in the Cabinet Office and MHCLG.
Deputy Secretary
Rob Leach
Rob Leach brings over 20 years’ experience at the heart of government, leading complex cross-Whitehall policy and programmes.
Before joining the Inquiry, he served as Deputy Director for Local Government Engagement at MHCLG, resetting central–local relationships, leading engagement with councils during the COVID-19 response, coordinating aspects of the Homes for Ukraine scheme, and helping councils prepare for Brexit.
Earlier in his career, Rob chaired senior industry advisory forums following the Grenfell tragedy to help unlock building safety remediation, worked extensively on resilience and local government reform, and helped establish the Young Advisors charity, which works to ensure young people can better engage with community life and improve local decision-making and services.