Trustee Board
The Trustee of the Plan is a corporate Trustee, Nortel Networks UK Pension Trust Ltd. This Trust Company is governed by its Memorandum and Articles of Association and it has fiduciary responsibility for the operation and management of the Plan. Under Trust law the Board must act equally in the interests of all members of the Plan.
The current Board is constituted as follows:-
1 Independent Chairman
1 Independent Director
1 Company Nominated Director
3 Member Nominated Directors (elected from the membership via the former Consultative Committee)
Members of the trustee board also serve on the Buyout, ADB and Investment Committees as indicated in the current Report and Accounts
Clive M Gilchrist – Chairman of the Trustee Board
With over 40 years experience in pensions and investment, Clive is Deputy Chairman of BESTrustees plc, having been Managing Director from its inception in 1992 until 2010.
A graduate in econometrics from the London School of Economics, Clive is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment and an Associate of the Society of Investment Professionals (the UK CFA Institute).
Starting in 1972 as a graduate trainee stockbroker he progressed to investment management. From 1978-1988 he was an investment manager/Director at the Post Office Staff Superannuation Fund/PosTel (now Hermes), responsible for managing both bond and equity portfolios for the Post Office and British Telecom pension funds. This was followed by four years as a Director of the Merchant Navy Officers Pension Fund/Argosy Asset Management before founding BESTrustees.
As an independent trustee he works with a wide range of pension funds of all sizes and chairs a number of trustee boards and investment committees.
Clive represented BESTustees on the Board of the Nortel Networks UK Pension Trust from July 1995 to June 2007 and then rejoined the Board in May 2008 as a company nominated Trustee.
BESTrustees Ltd (represented by Bob Hymas) – Independent Trustee and Chairman of the ADB
Bob Hymas has worked with pension schemes for over twenty years and is an experienced trustee. He has several scheme appointments with BESTrustees and is the chairman of schemes and committees as well as a co-trustee. Some of the committees he has chaired have been focused on specific de-risking transactions such as buy-outs.
Bob is a member of the Association of Professional Pensions Trustees, holds the PMI Award in Pension Trusteeship and he has held a variety of roles within the pensions industry. He is the immediate past chairman of the Pensions Research Accountants Group where he is still a director and is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales’ Pensions Sub-Committee.
Norma Bowles – Member Nominated Trustee
Norma took retirement in 2002 after 13 years working in the Pensions Department. She has extensive pension’s knowledge and brings a unique set of experiences from her period working within the Nortel Pensions Department and other roles in the pensions’ industry including some part-time work in pensions’ consultancy.
Norma was appointed a Director of Nortel Networks UK Pension Trust Limited in April 2005.
Brian Izzard – Member Nominated Trustee
Brian took early retirement in 2001 having worked for Nortel (and previously STC) since 1988 at the Basildon and New Southgate sites. He was a professional engineer (C. Eng, MiMechE) but spent most of his working career in the commercial and legal arena where he was Commercial Director for Nortel both in Europe and subsequently in Singapore for Asia Pacific.
Brian became a Trustee Director in April 2008, joined the ADB committee in September 2009 and has completed the Pensions Regulator “Trustee Toolkit” training programme. He worked for many years as a voluntary adviser for Citizens Advice and subsequently as a guidance specialist for the government sponsored Pension Wise service. More recently, Brian has been working as a volunteer for the Pensions Advisory Service (TPAS) – a function that has recently transferred to the Pensions Ombudsman (TPO).
Pat Masterson – Company Nominated Trustee
Pat was appointed a Company Nominated trustee in 2017. He is currently working as an Human Resources Consultant working with a range of public and private sector organisations on change management programmes and employee relations issues. In recent years he has worked as an Employee Relations Consultant with a broad range of clients private and public sector including Local Government and a number of Voluntary Sector organisations. He is also an Employer nominated panel member to the N Ireland industrial Court. Prior to this Pat worked for more than thirty years with Nortel. He is also an Employer nominated Panel Member of the N Ireland industrial Court.
In his most recent role with Nortel, he was Director for Employee & Labour Relations within Nortel’s EMEA region, with particular responsibility for UK and Ireland. Prior to this he had been leader of the Monkstown HR team, having joined the company at that site, as an STC plc employee in 1980. A chartered member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Pat has also represented Nortel Networks on a number of external bodies, between 2000 and 2005 chairing CBI’s N Ireland region Employment Affairs Committee.
Pat continues to live in N Ireland where he is married with five adult children.
He is an active participant and Treasurer of a registered Charity, the Association of Friends of the Music Service, a parents’ support group set up to assist children learning to play musical instruments.
Tim Rossiter – Member Nominated Trustee
Tim worked for Nortel (and formerly STL) for over 30 years until March 2009 in a number of R&D, Managerial and Technical Sales Support and Consultancy roles. He was elected to the board in December 2006 and is a member of the Investment Sub-committee.
After Nortel he worked as Core Network Architect for Sky Broadband with responsibility for planning Sky’s national broadband network until retirement and is now a pensioner of the scheme. He is a Chartered Engineer (MIET), holds an MSc in Electronics & Computer Science and has completed the Pensions Regulator “Trustee Toolkit” training programme.