Stephanie Martin
Stephanie Martin, formerly of Leeds in the United Kingdom and now of Auckland, received the Insignia of a Member of the Most Excellent of the British Empire, for services to children and families. Ms Martin has worked in the social services and caring profession since 1964, in both the voluntary and statutory sectors. She started out as a nursery nurse, moving into residential care of children in 1966 and then into children’s social work in 1971. She has served as a foster parent since 1978 when she took a career break to raise her own children, and has had many placements of fostered children ever since. She has combined fostering with a return to work since 1985 when she was appointed as a Guardian ad litem, or legal guardian to represent the interests of children in family court proceedings, with the Leeds, Bradford & Calderdale Panel before transferring into the Children and Family Courts Advisory and Support Services in 2001. She has been chair of the Leeds Home Start Project since 2004, and has run a monthly arts and crafts club for children in the Chapeltown area of Leeds; one of the city’s more deprived wards. She has the ability to find space for others in what other people would view as an impossibly busy life. In April 1990, she took time off without pay to fulfil her role as Mayoress when her husband was Mayor of Leeds.