KEYNOTE SPEAKER JEFFREY DONALDSON MP MLA, JUNIOR MINISTER OFMDFM

Jeffrey Donaldson was appointed as Junior Minister in the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister on 26 February 2008. As a Minister he has joint responsibility for Children and Young People’s issues, policies on Older Persons, coordinating Executive business in the Assembly and assisting the First Minister with the discharge of his Ministerial functions.

Aged 18, Jeffrey Donaldson joined the young Unionist movement and went on to become Chairman of the Ulster Unionist Council in 1985 and 1986.

In 1985, he was elected to the Assembly aged 22 becoming the youngest person ever to win a seat at Stormont with a majority of some 15,000.

In January 2004 he joined the Democratic Unionist Party and became a key member of the Party’s negotiating team for the review of the Belfast Agreement which culminated in a new Agreement at St Andrews in autumn of 2006.

In May 2005, Jeffrey was re-elected to Parliament as the DUP MP for and at the same time he was elected an Alderman of City Council.

Following the restoration of Devolved Government in May 2007, Jeffrey was appointed as the lead DUP member of the Northern Ireland Policing Board. He also chaired the Assembly and Executive Review Committee whose remit included the preparations for the devolution of Policing and Justice powers to the Assembly.

Jeffrey was also appointed by H M Queen as a Member of the Privy Council with a special interest in security matters. He is the DUP Spokesman on Home Office and Defence issues in the House of Commons.

Jeffrey Donaldson is married to Eleanor, and they have two children. CHAIR

PROFESSOR PAULINE MURPHY, PRESIDENT IRISH ASSOCIATION AND

CHAIRPERSON NORTHERN COMMITTEE

A southerner by birth, she went north after graduation (B.Comm,1st and PG H Dip Education) from NUI. Since then, she has pioneered many initiatives in education, at secondary, higher and community education levels. As Head of Economics and Social Sciences in St. Louise's College West Belfast -- the largest girls' school in Europe, she introduced A levels in Economics, Politics, Sociology and Accounts to the school curriculum and as Chief Examiner Economics for the NI Schools Council, she introduced GCE Economics to the NI schools curriculum. Whilst teaching in St. Louise's, she also founded the NI Community Education Association (NICEA), to address the adult, further and community education needs of Protestant and Catholic communities; this developed from the Community School which she founded in St. Louise's. NICEA, a non gov. organisation had branches in Belfast, Bellaghy and Ballymoney.

When she joined the University of Ulster in 1985, Pauline networked with NICEA and initiated the Women's Opportunities/Social Inclusion Unit which set up access progression routes for mature students into Higher Education. With European Funding, in the context of action based research projects, she designed a range of new University of Ulster courses from Certificate level up to post-grad Diploma and Master's level. This initiative has gone from strength to strength, in joint research with other education projects in European countries. Many of the courses are franchised to Institutes of Further and Higher Education in Northern Ireland and linked to Institutes of Technology in the south.

Another initiative which has made a significant impact in NI is the Training for Women Network (TWN), which Professor Murphy founded and chaired for 6 years. As an Intermediary Funding Body for the European Special Support Programme for Peace and Reconciliation in NI, TWN allocated £12 million for education, training and development programmes and continues to be a partner in current EU funded projects. This work has made a significant contribution to enabling women to play a greater role in creating a better society in Northern Ireland.

At international level, Pauline is a Council member of The Association for World Education (AWE); was convener of the ICEA Women in Action Network and has presented research papers and chaired conferences globally: in Caracas, Trinidad, Washington, Toronto, Capetown, Harare, Thailand and most European countries. She has published extensively and received many awards for her inspiring academic and humanitarian achievements.

Pauline , on retirement from the University was made Emerita Professor, Social Inclusion. She has established PPPd Consultancy and currently is consultant on Quality Assurance in a Higher Education Institution in Dublin and in Equality and Diversity in other Higher Education Institutions. She is proactive in networking and linking academic, business, civil society and local, regional, national and European sectors, as she believes that this is essential in developing and sustaining social, economic and political regeneration in Ireland.

The Irish Association has the potential to be a key player in this endeavour. Her involvement in this body is aimed to facilitate the realisation of this potential. RESPONDENT

DR JOHN BRADLEY, ECONOMIC MODELLING AND DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES

Dr John Bradley was formerly a Research Professor at the ESRI and is now an international consultant in the areas of economic development, Structural Fund design and evaluation. During his early career in the Irish Central Bank and the Economic and Social Research Institute he had substantial experience in research and evaluation in the areas of domestic (Irish) and EU policy analysis and specialised in the development of formal economic models and their application to a wide range of policy areas. He has advised the Irish government on medium-term economic and industrial strategy, and works as a consultant for the European Commission on a regular basis. He has published widely in these areas.

Dr Bradley has worked extensively on North-South economic issues since the late 1980s, and has published widely in academic and media formats.

His current research and consultancy activities focus mainly on the transition economies of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). He has made a special study of the impact of pre- accession and post-accession Structural Funds on the CEE economies and has acted as a consultant to government ministries in Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, East Germany and the Western Balkans.

Dr Bradley’s PhD was awarded by Trinity College, Dublin and he was awarded an MBA by Warwick University Business School. RESPONDENT MR MICHAEL SMYTH, HEAD OF ECONOMICS, SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS,

UNIVERSITY OF ULSTER

Primary degree in Political Economy and French at University College Dublin, followed by postgraduate study at Trinity College Dublin and Queen's University Belfast where he took a Master of Science in Economics.

He has been an academic economist for over twenty five years and has published widely in academic and professional journals. His research interests are in regional policy and local economic development. He is a member of the editorial board of the First Trust Bank Business Outlook and Economic Review and commentates regularly on the short to medium term prospects for the Northern Ireland economy.

He has worked in the Centre for Economic Forecasting at the London Business School and has taught economics in the University of Caen in France. He is a member of the CBI Northern Ireland Economic Affairs Committee and of the Economic Strategy Committee of the Institute of Directors. He is a former special adviser to the Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Committee of the and he acted as economic adviser to the Preparation for Government Committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly. He is a member of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) . He is Head of Economics at the University of Ulster.

He writes regularly about business and economic policy issues in the local and national press.