Dame Ann G Limb DBE CBE DL
Vice President and Founder
A Mancunian by birth, and a Milton Keynesian by adoption, Dame Ann Limb DBE CBE DL is an educationalist, philanthropist, business leader and charity entrepreneur. She is Chair of the London Stansted Cambridge Consortium, the body behind the UK’s Innovation Corridor and Chair of the Scout Association – the UK’s largest youth engagement and volunteering charity, the first ever woman to take on this role.
Ann was founding Chair of the South East Midlands Local Enterprise Partnership (SEMLEP) from 2011-2019, one of only a handful of women
nationally to have chaired a Local Enterprise Partnership. On stepping down from this role in March 2019, Ann was made inaugural LEP Ambassador for the national LEP Network and Cultural Ambassador for SEMLEP.
After a 25-year career in Further Education, as a lecturer and then College Principal in Milton Keynes and Cambridge, Ann was responsible, at senior civil servant level, for the UK government’s flagship digital learning initiative, learndirect and the national e-services programmes Direct Gov and UK online. Moving to the private sector in 2005, Ann worked as a government adviser in the UK and overseas; she led in the Departments for Education and Business Innovation & Skills on the setting up the online learning service unionlearn; she also advised on the creation of online citizens services in a range of overseas locations.
Ann has held a number of public and private sector non-executive directorships, including a Ministerial appointment at Homes England where she was on the Board from 2011 – 2018. From 2005 – 2011, Ann served as Chair of Milton Keynes Partnership, a successor body to the Milton Keynes
Development Corporation that established the new town in 1967. Since 2014, she has also served as Chair of ENTRUST, the national regulator of the government’s environmental tax credit scheme, the Landfill Communities Fund.
Ann has been associated with housing and infrastructure delivery in Milton Keynes for over a decade. She is a Patron of Bletchley Park – home of the code Breakers. Between 2011 and 2018, Ann served as Chair of Destination Milton Keynes, the city’s official tourism and visitor information service and Chair of the MK Major Events Board. This board had overall responsibility for delivery across Milton Keynes of the Rugby World Cup 2015 and served as the Steering Group for the city’s bid to become a European Capital of Culture. In January 2019, Ann became the first President of Destination Milton Keynes.
Ann is a member of the SE Council of Arts Council England and Chair of IF, the biennial Milton Keynes International Festival. Ann is Vice President the national educational charity, the Helena Kennedy Foundation, which she founded in 1998 to promote social inclusion in further and higher education by awarding bursaries to students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Ann is also Chair of the City & Guilds Group. In the 2011 Birthday Honours, Ann was awarded the OBE for her work in education and in 2015 ‘upgraded’ to CBE for public and political services. Ann is Deputy Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire, where she has lived since 1986. In n March 2016, Ann was recognised by a lifetime achievement award given by Milton Keynes Business Leaders. In March 2019, she was named in the Northern Power Women Power list as one of the 50 most influential women born in the North of England.
For more information about Dr Ann G Limb CBE DL, please visit her website www.annlimb.co.uk