Sponsored by the Justice and Peace Commission, the first meeting will be held in Hull

Venue

Lindsay Suite, Staff House, University of Hull, Cottingham Road, Hull, HU6 7RX

[gmap map:6]

Date

Saturday 17th May at 11.00 am

Speaker

Paul Vallely, Associate Editor of ‘The Independent’, former Chair of Traidcraft and Progressio

Title

‘How to effect real change in the real world – the G8, Geldof and the grassroots’

Chaired by Professor Eamon Duffy, Professor of the History of Christianity, Magdalene College, Cambridge.

About Fr Tony Storey

Father Tony Storey, a very much-loved and priest of the Middlesbrough Diocese, hailed from the former East Riding of Yorkshire. He was a man with an immense love and knowledge of the countryside, and of people.

He was passionate in his work for ecumenism (becoming the first Roman Catholic priest to preach in York Minster since the Reformation) and for issues of Justice and Peace (he set up support from his then parish in Cottingham for a parish in Sierra Leone before the civil war there). He was also a great historian.

Father Tony returned to the Lord in 2007. May he rest in peace.

About Paul Vallely CMG

Paul Vallely has been a theatre critic, war reporter, religious commentator, foreign correspondent and leader writer. As Africa correspondent of The Times he covered the Ethiopian famine of 1984-85 for which he was commended as International Reporter of the Year. He then travelled across Africa with Bob Geldof to decide how to spend the money raised by Live Aid. He subsequently ghosted Geldof’s best-selling autobiography, ‘Is That It?’

He has reported from 30 countries in the developing world and was nominated for the UN Media Peace Prize. He has chaired two major development agencies, Traidcraft and the Catholic Institute for International Relations (CIIR – since renamed Progressio). He has been editorial adviser to the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.

A former executive editor of the Independent on Sunday and editor of the Sunday Times News Review, he is now Associate Editor of The Independent where he writes on social, ethical and cultural issues.

In 2004-5 Vallely was seconded to Tony Blair’s Commission for Africa and was co-author of its final report. He then worked with Geldof on Live 8, and with Geldof and Bono lobbying the Gleneagles G8 summit.

His books include:

• Bad Samaritans: First World Ethics and Third World Debt
• Promised Lands, a study of land reform in the Philippines, Brazil and Eritrea
• The New Politics: Catholic Social Teaching for the 21st century (ed)
• A Place of Redemption: a Christian approach to punishment and prison.

He also wrote the sleevenotes for the Live Aid and Live 8 DVDs and the official Live 8 Book, Hello World.

In the 2006 Birthday Honours he was made a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) for services to journalism and to the developing world. He lives in Manchester.