Colin Reid

Colin has an Honours degree in Psychology and a master’s degree in Social Work (Queens University Belfast) qualifying as a social worker in 1987. He went on to obtain a post graduate certificate in Social Welfare Law and spent the first part of his career working in local authority statutory family and childcare in several roles and was a social work team leader for 5 years. Colin moved to NSPCC in 1999 in a policy and public affairs role and had a particular interest in vetting and barring policy and legislation at the NI Assembly and Westminster. He did a part time secondment for a year to the Office of the First and Deputy First Ministers’ (OFMDFM) Children’s Unit in 2010. Colin served as a Board member of the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA) 2005-2013, NI’s Health and Social Care Regulator   and as a member of the Authority’s Audit Committee. He subsequently was appointed to the NI Food Advisory Committee of the Food Standards Agency (FSA) for 2 terms. He is currently a member of Northern Ireland Social Care Council’s (NISCC) Fitness to Practice Committee and has recently been appointed as a lay member of the Optical Regulators Board in the Republic of Ireland. Colin is also a school governor. Colin was Deputy Chair and Chair of British Association of Social Workers in NI from 2014-2019 and is currently Head of Safeguarding Services at the Education Authority.