Mental Health at Sea

Nusrat Ghani MP

Madam Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons - former Minister of Maritime

Biography

Nusrat Ghani was a Minister of State (Minister for Europe) in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office between 26 March 2024 and 5 July 2024. She was previously a Minister of State at the Department for Business and Trade as well as Minister of State responsible for the Investment Security Unit at the Cabinet Office from 7 February 2023 to 26 March 2024.

She was previously Minister of State at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy from 27 October 2022 to 7 February 2023, and Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Transport from January 2018 to February 2020.

Nusrat was a Government Whip between July 2019 and December 2019, and an Assistant Government Whip from January 2018 to July 2019.

Education

Nusrat was the first woman in her family to be formally educated. She attended state comprehensive school before studying at Birmingham City University (BA Government and Politics) and Leeds University (MA International Relations).

Political career

Nusrat was elected Conservative MP for Wealden in 2015.

In parliament Nusrat has been a member of a number of Select Committees, including:

• Business Energy and Industrial Strategy Select Committee (2020 to 2022)
• Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission (2017 to 2018)
• Foreign Affairs Committee (2017 to 2018)
• Armed Forces Bill Committee (2015)
• Home Affairs Committee (2015 to 2017)

Most recently, in her role as a member of the BEIS Select Committee, she has led on a number of enquires, including a probe into the use of Uyghur slave labour in UK supply chains.

Nusrat was part of the UK delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly from 2020 to 2022 and the Rapporteur of the Science and Technology Committee.

For her work in raising awareness of the plight of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, Nusrat was nominated for the NATO Women of Peace and Security Prize, finishing runner-up to the Honourable Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives.

Career outside politics

Before beginning her career in politics, Nusrat was employed by the charities Age UK and Breakthrough Breast Cancer, and later for the BBC World Service.

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Sharon Coveney

Deputy Chief Executive, Merchant Navy Welfare Board

Sharon joined the Board in May 2013. She chose to follow the footsteps of both her parents and brother by joining the Merchant Navy in 1993. After spending 4 years at sea with P&O cruises she pursued a career change to work with homeless people suffering with mental illness. She then spent the next 14 years delivering community support and accommodation based support services. Her last role included the management and service delivery of 8 supported housing projects for care leavers, homeless pregnant teenagers, single homeless and mental health / dual diagnosis. Sharon describes herself as having a natural empathy towards people and a “can do” attitude. Her mother lived at the Merchant Seaman’s War Memorial Society (now known as Care Ashore) for over 20 years. This, she says, has given her a thorough awareness of the issues that seafarers may face as well as personal experience of a maritime charity that provides accommodation and support.

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Gordon Foot NI Hon. Sec. , MNWB Ambassador & IMarEST Fellow

Merchant Navy Welfare Board Ambassador

Gordon has been a sea going mariner since 1982. First in nuclear submarines and subsequently he continued his sea time with the Merchant Navy and offshore critical infrastructure construction projects. This included oil and gas, renewables, environmental projects and more recently LNG ventures offshore Senegal. He works tirelessly for cadets, junior ranks and rates and those less fortunate internationally by mentoring and sharing his passion for the maritime. A large part of this has been championing seafarers’ welfare and assisting those that are marginalised or who do not have a voice.

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Chris Goldsworthy CEng CMarEng FIMarEST

Chief Executive Officer, IMarEST

My marine career started at 19 years old after A-levels as a cadet with P&O Containers [while] attending South Tyneside Marine College for the three-year Higher National Diploma (HND) course. 

I absolutely relished my sea time, all with the same company, which lasted a total of 16 years. I count myself very fortunate to come through my sea time at the time that I did, to experience the traditional watchkeeping on motor and steam vessels, then [to experience] Unattended Machinery Spaces (UMS). 

Still with P&O, but after [the] merger with Royal Nedlloyd, I was invited to come ashore as a seconded fleet superintendent. The intention was to have six months in the office, a short leave, contract at sea, a second six months in the office, then rotate back to permanent sea staff. 

However, after 20 years in ship management ashore, I'm still waiting for the return to sea! Two weeks into my shore career, an assigned vessel had an engine room fire, thankfully with no injuries, and the crew did an exceptional job extinguishing the fire, which led me to leading a nine-week repair in Panama - a steep learning curve. 

Then from owner management, following the acquisition of P&O Nedlloyd by Maersk, I moved into third-party ship management with Columbia Ship Management in Cyprus as technical superintendent, then subsequently as technical manager in charge of the Japanese fleet. The teamwork and change in scope were welcomed and led to inclusion into more company operational and strategic decisions.  

To develop vessel type knowledge, I then accepted a fleet manager role at Bernhard Schulte Ship Management, also in Cyprus, managing a fleet of product, crude, and chemical tankers. Following five years in that role, I accepted a position, fleet director, with a vessel owner in the Netherlands to create a new in-house ship management company, with full P&L responsibility, which involved team selection and building, Safety Management System (SMS) creation and implementation. 

Within 10 months we had 10 vessels in management and had passed a Tanker Management Self Assessment (TMSA) II audit with clean results. 

Then came the movement to Tamar Ship Management in Hong Kong, initially as technical fleet manager, then with the near tripling of the fleet size in three years, led to restructuring and a new role as technical director. 

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