Our Board make the key decisions about the organisation and provide challenge and oversight over our staff team to ensure that all decisions and activity are in the best interests of our tenants.
Rob Hughes
Chair of the Board
Broughty Ferry
Rob is a retired housing professional with 40 years experience working in various social housing roles, the last of those as Operations Manager for Hillcrest Homes, responsible for the management of 6,500 tenancies.
He has also previously served 12 years as a committee member of Rural Stirling Housing Association, and has served as a Scottish Housing Regulator board appointee to another Registered Social Landlord.
David Leishman
Vice Chair
East Lothian
David is a Qualified Accountant with ACCA, with a focus on Financial and Management Accounting, and has over 7 years of experience in the Social Housing sector in various Finance roles.
He was elected Vice Chair at the recent HfL AGM and is excited to take on this new role, serving the tenants and other local stakeholders, and to also help support the Chair in delivering continued good governance of Homes for Life.
David currently lives in East Lothian and would like to contribute to his local community through Homes for Life.
Jamila Greig
Cockenzie
Jamila has recently stepped down after serving her second term as our Chair and has been a Member since 2008.
A tenant board member, she is passionate about our local area and delivering our promises to our tenants. She led the organisation through a difficult period in 2021/22 and is now working with our recently appointed Chief Executive Officer to grow Homes for Life and see it flourish.
David Rose
Longniddry
David is an experienced Executive Member of EVH and a Board Member for East Lothian Housing Association. He was one of HfL's original Board Members at set up in 1998.
David is currently the Chair of HfL's Audit and Compliance Committee.
He brings his experience as a Community Councillor and a spell as the Secretary of the East Lothian Care & Repair Charitable Trust to our Board.
Graeme MacGregor
Haddington
Neil MacDonald
Edinburgh
Originally from the Outer Hebrides but now living in Edinburgh.
Neil is a trained quantity/building surveyor with over 20 years experience working with councils and housing associations on reactive repairs and planned maintenance. He is also trained and qualified in health and safety management including asbestos and fire safety.
Neil aims to give back some of his knowledge and experience to benefit Homes for Life.
Debby Gillett
Innerleithen
Debby is a dedicated housing professional with 18 years of experience delivering services to social housing tenants across the Scottish Borders.
Currently working as a Development Manager Debby is regularly involved with contract management, acquisition, appraisal, negotiation, and the delivery of quality new build homes. Key aspects of Debby’s work are to develop strategy, policy and process to ensure compliance, value for money, and business growth.
Alistair Kettles
Haddington
Originally from Dundee where he commenced his quantity surveyor training over 50 years ago with an East Lothian company. Subsequently moved to East Lothian where has lived over for 40 years.
Alistair is a highly experienced construction and property professional who has experience in the many sectors of the industry. New build housing has regularly featured and he has worked with several social housing providers and mainstream speculative developments both as a contractor and developer. He has extensive experience of working as an Executive Director board member and prior to retiring ran his own construction and property consultancy for over10 years.
Alistair retired after having a stroke and as part of his recovery goals he seeks voluntary opportunities to share his skillset to benefit others.
Jav Yaqub
Wishaw
Jav is an experienced IT professional having managed large enterprise infrastructures and platforms for 30 years for tier one organisations such as the NHS, Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), Glasgow City Council and many others. His specialism is in improving and renewing complex distributed IT platforms and services and he hopes to bring this experience to benefit Homes For Life with their aspirations on transforming their technology for the betterment of their customers.
Shamsu Rahman
Edinburgh
Bio to follow
Scott Robertson
Edinburgh
Bio to follow
The position of Secretary is held by the Chief Executive Officer.
Gill Binnie
Chief Executive Office
Gill has more than 20 years’ experience leading the development and delivery of social housing services, with substantial experience of working in partnership with other RSL’s, Local Authorities, and Development Contractors on regeneration and new build projects.
She has a focus on improving Tenant Services, business efficiency and the Customer Journey.