Steve set up and has been leading this 'not for profit distribution' organisation since its inception in 2004. BEF focuses on changing communities in some of the UK's most deprived areas for the better by the innovative use of finance. Starting with a zero balance sheet it has grown to manage over £60m of funds and has over £35m of its own funds. The BEF Group operates out of 4 offices across the North of England. The group, consists of 8 companies, a number of which service its third-party fund management delivery of the two Northern Powerhouse Investment Funds on behalf of British Business Bank.Steve has been an advisor to recent governments on community development & Access to Finance for SMEs and has reported to the commission for banking standards & Banking Futures. He has worked with a number of influential bodies on the use of finance to transform communities and was an advisor for the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Business pilot programme in the UK. He is a past chair & vice chair of Responsible Finance and continues to lobby actively within the sector. He was a member of the Ecology Building Society’s board lending committee for a number of years & is a trustee for a very large UK charity.He has worked successfully at board level across a variety of sectors ranging from engineering, plastics, automotive as well as Brand Marketing. Initially trained as a mechanical engineer, he worked in precision engineering for some 18 years. He qualified later in life as a Barrister, he is a Chartered Banker and Engineer. He has strong financial, banking, legal and technical skills and a proven track record of growing and developing businesses.