Our Team
Birthrights was founded in 2013 by human rights barrister, Elizabeth Prochaska, and Rebecca Schiller, a doula and writer on birth, parenting and women’s rights. Our work is overseen by our expert board, including senior health professionals, policy-makers, people with lived experience and lawyers.
Interim Chief Executive Officer
Tracey Fletcher
Tracey is an experienced and values-driven leader who brings over 30 years of expertise in the voluntary and community sector. Based in London, she has more than 15 years supporting small and medium-sized organisations to thrive, particularly those led by or working with Black and minoritised communities. With a strong track record in strategy, governance, fundraising and organisational development, she has held senior executive roles across national, regional and local charities and social enterprises.
Her approach is grounded in clarity, compassion and collaboration, qualities that will be invaluable to lead Birthrights while the recruitment process for our next CEO/s is ongoing. Alongside her work as a consultant, she has served as a trustee, chair and non-executive director at an NHS Trust. We’re excited to have her on board to guide us through this transitional period.
Operations Lead
Sammy Beecham
Sammy (she/her) has over 15 years’ experience of working in the charitable and local government sector, working across a range of public policy areas including housing, education and health. Sammy previously worked for York Women’s Counselling Service, playing a leading role in developing the charity’s strategy and governance. Prior to this, she worked for Shelter, the National housing and homelessness charity, before becoming Operations Director at E-ACT, a multi-academy trust that manages multiple schools across England. In this role Sammy held responsibility for governance, HR, communications, data insight and major projects.
Training Co-ordinator
Beth Russell
Beth (she/her) is a midwife, hypnobirthing practitioner and MSc Student, and her passion for human rights in childbirth stemmed from advocating for women and birthing people as a midwife. Her wish for everyone is to have access to the information that they want and to be unwaveringly supported in what is right for them as an individual, and she believes rights based, respectful care is fundamental in ensuring both physical and psychological safety during birth. She is incredibly proud to be a part of the Birthrights team.
Training Coordinator
Amisha Abeyawardene
Amisha (they/she) is a doula based in London who is passionate about providing individualised and trauma-informed support to those most marginalised by the healthcare system, especially queer and trans Black and brown people. They also work with Neighbourhood Doulas to provide perinatal support to those who are lacking a birthing partner and with other complex needs such as asylum seekers/refugees and survivors of domestic/sexual violence. Amisha is also a member of Kinhood Collective, a reproductive health collective created to support LGBTQIA+ people and families.
Legal Lead and Training Coordinator (Maternity Cover)
Laura Mullarkey
Laura (she/her) is a senior lawyer who spent fourteen years working in corporate law in top global law firms. In her previous role, she spent six years creating and building out the training and knowhow function for her team, servicing internal and external clients. Throughout her career, she has acted on many human rights matters, pro bono, focusing on women’s and LGBTQ+ rights issues. Her passion, ignited during her own three pregnancies, is advocating for all women and birthing people’s human rights during pregnancy and birth, and she is delighted to join the Birthrights team.
Advice and Information Manager (Maternity Cover)
Lora Evans
Lora (she/her) is an experienced service manager and partnership lead, focused on delivering co-produced, trauma-informed, and preventative services. She is committed to ensuring people have the knowledge and tools needed to advocate for themselves, alongside accessible, expert advice and advocacy for those who need it. She firmly believes healthcare should promote and respect informed decisions about people’s own bodies. Her work with undocumented and asylum-seeking women, along with her own pregnancy experience, drives her commitment to rights respecting care for all women and birthing people.
Advice and Information Co-ordinator
Lorraine Pryce
Lorraine (she/her) is a doula and photographer supporting families across West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester. After training with Nurturing Birth in 2019, Lorraine has cared for a diverse number of clients with compassion and a tenacity to improve the birthing experience for all. “I believe every birthing person deserves to have a positive experience on their journey to becoming a parent, no matter who they are and how they choose to birth and nurture their babies.” Lorraine offers birth and postnatal doula support whilst also capturing sacred moments through her birth and postpartum photography services.
Advice and Information Manager (on maternity leave)
Danielle Farrow
Danielle (she/her) is a Doula, Hypnobirthing teacher and Holistic Therapist supporting women, birthing people and families across Merseyside and Cheshire. Studying for her MSc Psychology in 2020, Danielle specialised in the transition to motherhood and in particular what people need to thrive during and post birth. Since then, she has established a business offering birth and postnatal Doula support services, Hypnobirthing and pregnant bump and body casting. Danielle is passionate about supporting people to access information and knowledge so that they may flourish in the early years of their children’s lives and beyond.
Communications Manager
Miranda Atty
Miranda (she/her) has over a decade of experience working as a TV and digital journalist and travelling all over the world, before moving into the charity and NGO space. Passionate about human rights, she previously worked for a leading international girls’ rights charity covering issues like COVID, the Southern African food crisis and instability in the Sahel region.
Fundraising Manager
Cathy Welch
Cathy (she/her) has been specialising in charity fundraising, with a focus on trusts and foundations, for nearly 10 years. During that time she has worked directly for social justice, arts, and care charities, and, most recently, as a consultant. She has secured multiple small and large grants from funders including National Lottery Community Fund, Children in Need, Henry Smith Charity, Garfield Weston Foundation and many others. She has also developed organisational fundraising strategies, run individual-giving and crowd-funding campaigns, and delivered training and mentoring.
Training Manager
Farah Lodhi
Farah (she/her) is an experienced manager, trainer, and advocate with a background in human rights and social justice, both in the UK and globally. She has led projects across the Global South, focusing on empowering marginalised communities through education, advocacy, and systemic change. Deeply motivated by the power of education to drive change, she has trained leading global organisations specialising in the intersection of social justice, healthcare equity, and climate action, as well as NHS healthcare professionals, supporting them to recognise and challenge systemic injustices within healthcare delivery. With a passion for creating inclusive, rights-based approaches to care, she continues to coach and manage trainers across multiple sectors in the UK.
Communications Officer
Celine Raynaud
Celine (she/her) is a trained journalist with prior experience in the non-profit sector and working as a multimedia journalist for media outlets and publications. Her experience includes roles as a staff reporter for news and B2B media outlets, as well as archival research for a factual political TV documentary series following her training at City St. George’s (University of London). Passionate about driving positive change, she has also worked in the NGO space to promote the work of artists from marginalised backgrounds.
Policy & Campaigns Manager
Elif Ege
Elif (she/her) is a feminist and activist who has experience in monitoring of the implementation of laws and policies on gender-based violence, conducting national and international advocacy and organising campaigns in Turkey and Europe. She has a PhD from the Global Gender and Sexuality Studies program at SUNY University at Buffalo, USA. She is excited about working collectively to hold institutions accountable and to shift wider systems to achieve safe maternity care, free from discrimination, coercion and violence.
Advice and Information Co-ordinator
Atosa Stedman
Atosa (she/her) is a dedicated Doula, Hypnobirthing Teacher, and Mindful Breastfeeding Practitioner based in Kent. She is passionate about empowering families through pregnancy, birth, and early parenthood by providing evidence-based education, compassionate care, and advocacy in the birth space. She has supported countless parents in navigating the maternity system, helping them to make informed choices and advocate for respectful, person-centred care. She has experience working alongside healthcare professionals and supporting families in situations where their rights and choices have been challenged.