Alison Hastings, Trustee for England

"As an editor in the regional press for many years, I admired the BBC for its rich, informative and entertaining content but also saw it as a strong competitive threat.

"Since becoming involved as a Trustee I appreciate that the BBC genuinely tries to live up to the concept of universality, and the quality of its output is so high that whoever you are, wherever you are in the UK, you'd be hard pushed not to find something to appreciate.

"I bring to the Trust an understanding of the pressures on the commercial media in an increasingly competitive environment, at a time when the BBC is looking at how it can be a better partner for the creative industries."

About Alison

A journalist through and through, Alison spent a year at the National College of Journalism before starting out on local newspapers in Hertfordshire.

Working for what was then Thomson Regional Newspapers, Alison moved to Newcastle to become Head of Editorial Staff Development for their regional operations. The Newcastle Evening Chronicle then beckoned, where she became Editor aged 29, and built the paper's reputation for investigative and campaigning journalism.

After a number of years in the commercially competitive world of regional press, during which she was appointed to the Press Complaints Commission, Alison moved with her museum director husband to Liverpool, and set up her own media consultancy business. They have five children.