Mick is from Leeds and worked his entire adult life for Adult Social Care in Leeds City Council, starting as a Care Assistant and through a long career becoming Deputy Director of Adults and Health for LCC and Leeds NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups, responsible for commissioning a wide range of services.

He then became Chief Officer for Transformation and Innovation, leading on work on: Proliferating Asset Based Community Development (ABCD); Significant servicetransformation; Digital Health and Wellbeing and Equality and Inclusion; He also established the Leeds Arts and Health & Wellbeing Network.

Since retiring in 2020 he has balanced his time between continuing to work to promote ABCD as a Senior Associate at Nurture Development, being a volunteer and a Trustee of PAFRAS which supports destitute asylum seekers in Leeds, a
board member of Marching Out Together (the Leeds United LGBTQ+ fan group) and with his partner, is a Shared Lives Carer.

He is a long-standing champion of the arts scene in Leeds, particularly where it has a strong community focus and where it can bring about positive change.