Board of Directors and Director of Tourism

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Maureen McAllister - Director of Tourism

Previously Head of Culture and Tourism at South West of England Regional Development Agency,  Maureen leads the Partners for England Executive, and is currently working directly with VisitEngland to develop regional tourism framework agreements.

She has many years experience of strategic tourism marketing and development, working for Japan Travel Bureau, Balkan Holidays and as Head of Tourism for Gloucester City Council. At Marketing Birmingham her remit was to develop leisure tourism in the city. This led to Marketing Birmingham being awarded Beacon Status for Promoting Sustainable Tourism in 2004. Before joining the South West RDA in 2006, she was Director of Regeneration and Tourism at Torbay Development Agency.

Maureen has an MBA from Gloucestershire University, and is co-founder and formerly Vice Chair of DP UK. 

Board of Directors

Alistair Handyside - Executive Director and Chair of the Board 

With over 25-years experience in a range of senior Management roles in the UK and abroad, aside from developing the national award winning Higher Wiscombe self-catering properties, Alistair now works as a consultant in a variety of fields. These include part- time roles as Chief Executive of Salcombe Dairy Ice Cream, and Simplexo Ltd, an enterprise search technology company. He holds several directorships, including Premier Cottages and DEBI, (Devon Environmental Business Initiative), a group that promotes sustainable business practice. His passionate belief is that quality and sustainability are not only compatible, but essential moving towards 2015.

Carolyn Custerson

Carolyn has over 25 years experience in the travel and tourism industry. For the past eight years Carolyn has been director of Close Focus Tourism Consultancy providing practical marketing support to a wide range of tourism businesses across Devon and Cornwall.  She has been involved with the regional tourism strategy for a number of years contributing to the delivery of Welcome to Excellence customer service programmes and the launch of the Sheer Indulgence online brand marketing campaign for South West England.

Claire Wellings

Claire is Head of Department of Leisure, Tourism, Hospitality and Events at the University of Gloucestershire. She has lectured in tourism management since 1991 at three different Higher Education institutions, and has also worked in the events and museums sectors. Claire's interests are in tourism education, skills and training, and in raising the profile of tourism as a positive career choice. She has worked for many years with the Association for Tourism in Higher Education, and with industry bodies such as Cheltenham Tourism Forum and the Tourism Skills Network South West.

Stephen Wray

Recently appointed to the post of Partnerships Director (Creative Economy) in September 2008, Stephen has held a number of senior management positions with Bristol City Council since joining the authority in July 1997.  He joined Bristol initially as Director of Leisure Services and then following a departmental reorganisation in 2000, took responsibility for the Environment, Transport and Leisure Department.  Following further managerial changes Stephen returned to his substantive role as Director of Culture and Leisure in 2005.

John Sheaves

John farmed for 15 years and set up East Devon's first farm shop.  He then moved into the environmental sector advising farmers in Dorset on how they could introduce environmental principles into their farming businesses, and then managed an environmental consultancy for 5 years before joining Taste of the West as its Chief Executive in 2005.  Having recently developed a small luxury camping business on the home farm, he is well placed to draw on experience to help drive this objective forward.

Martin Cox (re-appointed)

Martin is Managing Director of West Dorset Leisure Holidays, which operate four holiday parks in the Bridport area of Dorset.  He is past National Chairman and Vice President of the British Holiday & Home Parks Association (BH&HPA) and is a past Director of the Caravan Industry Training Organisation. Martin is currently the BH&HPA representative on the European Federation of Caravan Park Operators.  A chartered Company Secretary, his parks are highly rated not only in the National Quality Assurance Scheme but have also won top awards in the David Bellamy Conservation Award Scheme.

Paul Moir (re-appointed)

For the past 20 years Paul has been a Director of a garden attraction in Painswick, Gloucestershire, following a career in marketing within multi-national companies. He is very active in the local industry participating in the Cheltenham Borough Tourism Forum, Stroud District Tourism Forum. He sits on the Board of The Cotswold and Forest of Dean DMO and has been Treasurer of the Cotswolds Attractions Group since its inception over 10 years ago. Paul has been a member of the Board of South West Tourism for 4 years.