The national volunteering charity Volunteering Matters has announced that Lord Freud will be its new president. He succeeds Lord Levy, who spent 20 years as president. Lord Freud has already played a key role at Volunteering Matters, founding the award winning intergenerational Grandmentors project, which matches volunteers over age 50 with young care leavers. He is a former minister of state for welfare reform.

Allan Cowie has recently taken up the director of services role at Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland (CHSS) after 13 years with Macmillan Cancer Support, initially as general manager for the charity in Scotland and as UK wide director of quality & impact for last five years. Allan joins the team at CHSS with over 25 years’ experience of innovation and improving service delivery across health and social care and will be working with the team at CHSS to deliver the charity’s No Life Half Lived strategy.

Scottish Churches Housing Action (SCHA) has appointed Richard Howat as chief executive. He brings some 27 years of experience in the care and homelessness sector to SCHA, predominantly through his work with Transform Community Development (formerly Dundee Cyrenians), and from 2011 to date as operations manager with Positive Steps Dundee. Richard’s empathy for the lived experience of those who suffer homelessness, and his understanding of the causes and drivers that lie behind it mean that he is the ideal person to enable SCHA to be a voice for the churches in the field of homelessness and affordable housing policy at a national level, and to be a voice to the churches in helping them to understand, and make a difference, in their local communities.