Ann Macfarlane, a wheelchair user, is a leading Disability Independent Living and Equalities Consultant, focusing on health and social care as it affects disabled citizens. She specialises in Independent Living, Direct Payments and Personal Budgets, and has been involved in the Disabled Peoples’ Movement in the UK for many years. She is a consultant for the National Centre for Independent Living, an ‘Expert by Experience’ for the Care Quality Commission, and the Department of Health’s National End of Life Care Programme. Ann was appointed a Trustee to the Social Care Institute of Excellence in 2007. She is well recognised in the local community for her statutory and voluntary sector commitment and is a member of the Local Authority’s Safeguarding Board, chair of their user Adults at Risk Sub-Group, and the Primary Care Trust’s End-of-Life Care Group. She is Patron of Kingston Centre for Independent Living.

Ann received her MBE in 1992 for her involvement with disabled people, locally, nationally and internationally and awarded the OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2009.