About us
The Independent Agricultural Appeals Panel (IAAP) considers appeals against decisions of the Rural Payments Agency.
Our responsibilities
The IAAP is responsible for:
- considering appeals against decisions made by the Rural Payments Agency (RPA)
- holding panel hearings at which appellants may make their case
- making recommendations to the Minister of State for Farming, Food and the Marine Environment in respect of individual agricultural appeals
Who we are
Current panel members are:
| Name | Details |
|---|---|
| Colin Agar | Runs a small farm in the Staffordshire Moorlands rearing pedigree Aberdeen Angus cattle. He is a Derbyshire magistrate and a member of the Staffordshire Police Misconduct Panel. He previously held a number of senior Civil Service positions. |
| Andrew Brown | An arable and conservation farmer both tenanted and owner occupied. A former NFU regional chairman, a former director of the Oxford Farming Conference, former High Sheriff of Rutland, a chartered environmentalist and magistrate. Currently the Local Authority Chairman. |
| Madeleine Crawley | Tenant beef, sheep and arable farmer. Formerly a veterinary advisor to Soil Association Certification Limited, contract dairy farmer and mixed practice veterinary surgeon. |
| Charles Daniell | Rural chartered surveyor and agricultural valuer running a private land agency business covering Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Herefordshire. |
| Jim Dixon | Jim is a biologist who worked throughout his career in conservation, the public service and heritage. As a graduate, he held numerous research, survey and short contract posts before being appointed Agriculture Policy Officer for the RSPB, working in London, Brussels and widely across Europe. He then went on to join the civil service , working in the MAFF policy unit where he played a role in helping create the new department Defra. He then moved to become Chief Executive of the Peak District National Park Authority, a role he held for 11 years. In the last 4 years of his time in the Peak District, he led the UK family of national parks. He now has a portfolio career and has held non-executive roles with Defra (the Independent Agricultural Appeals Panel), Northumbrian Water, The National Heritage Memorial Fund and the NHS. He is also the Director of a small, specialist tourism business, a books and antiques business and he writes a monthly column on nature for The Times. He was recently a member of the Glover Review of National Parks and AONB and has been the independent person on public body appointment panels. |
| Ian Dreelan | Assistant Coroner for Birmingham & Solihull and Gloucestershire. Senior lawyer and management consultant and former Army Officer with a smallholding in Wiltshire. |
| Richard Fenwick | An agricultural botanist whose career was spent at the National Institute of Agricultural Botany, Cambridge, working on the evaluation of cereal, oilseed and pulse crop varieties. Now retired, he is Chairman of the BASIS Education and Training Committee and a member of the BASIS Board of Trustees. |
| Kitty Hamilton | Director of Willoughby Farms Ltd - a large, family, farming estate in Lincolnshire, and a director of Alford Crematorium Ltd. Trustee of Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust. Holds an MSc in Biological Recording, with a research focus on farmland birds. |
| Cicely Hunt | Company director and rural practice chartered surveyor specialising in agricultural grants advice to large UK conservation organisations and other land management and farming clients. |
| Neil Johnson | Employed by the National Trust as food and farming adviser for the North West region. Previous employments as livestock buyer, Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group adviser, and BASIS-qualified agronomist. |
| Scott Kirby | Farm manager at Harper Adams University. Previously worked as a farm business management consultant at SAC and in a range of farm management roles. |
| John Lee | Self-employed farmer and chairman of a number of agricultural and rural boards including the Devon County Agricultural Association. Past chairman of SW Sustainable Farming and Food Strategy, member of European Commission CAP Advisory Committee and High Sheriff of Devon in 2013 to 2014. |
| Christine Malseed | Farmer on Dartmoor for the last 37 years with her son on a tenanted hill farm. She also runs her own rural business consultancy service covering South-west England. |
| Gordon Meek OBE | Northumberland farmer running owner occupied and part-tenanted mixed livestock and arable farm and member of the Agricultural Lands Tribunal. Past NFU county chairman and county national livestock delegate. |
| Sarah Pettitt | Independent agri-food, environment & sustainability policy specialist. Managing Director of Food Chain Partnerships Ltd. Voluntary Initiative Champion. Actively involved with our 4th generation family farm in Lincolnshire. Natural England Farmland Conservation Lead Advisor for Lincolnshire. Former NFU National Horticulture and Potato Chairman, Audit Committee, Policy Board, Council and UK National Frozen Vegetable Board Chairman. BASIS Agronomy Crop Protection IPM & Food Hygiene on Farm TSO Trainer. Former member of Defra’s Fruit and Vegetable Task Force, Assured Food Standards Board, Lincolnshire Agriculture and Horticulture Forum and Agricultural Technical Manager for Christian Salvesen Foods. |
| Keith Siddorn | Tenant farmer in Cheshire. Member of the Agricultural Lands Tribunal and the Tenant Farmers Association. |
| Laura Smallwood | Barrister specialising in property law and smallholder in West Sussex breeding pedigree sheep. Assistant Commissioner for the Boundary Commission for England in the 2018 review of parliamentary constituencies. |
| Gareth Wall | Rural practice chartered surveyor, agricultural valuer and consultant practising within Herefordshire and the West Midlands. Gareth grew up on his family’s beef, sheep and arable farm and he remains actively involved within the agricultural industry. |
| Judith Webb MBE | Chair of the West Midlands Forestry & Woodlands Advisory Committee, a part-time forestry & arboriculture lecturer, member of the Welsh Government Independent Appeals Panel for Rural Grants & Payments, lay member of Nursing & Midwifery Council and Social Work England professional conduct panels, Judicial Conduct and Investigations Office Disciplinary Panel Lay Member. Former Farm Conservation Adviser, Rural Development Service Chair, Forestry Commissioner and JNCC Deputy Chair. |
| Tessa Wigham | Graduate in Agricultural Sciences, BASIS registered Environmental Adviser member of the Institute of Agricultural Secretaries & Administrators and a partner in a family farm. Employed by an agricultural charity for twenty years and continues to assist a forestry consultancy business. |
| Patrick Wrixon | Farmer on a mixed holding in Herefordshire. Past Board member of LEAF (Linking Environment and Farming). Past President of the European Initiative for the Development of Sustainable Agriculture. Past Chairman of Herefordshire NFU. |