JANE WINTER: BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
Jane Winter has been monitoring and researching the human rights dimension of the conflict in Northern Ireland since 1990. Between 1995 and 2012 she was the Director of British Irish RIGHTS WATCH, an independent human rights non-governmental organisation whose services are available, free of charge, to anyone whose human rights have been violated because of the conflict, regardless of religious, political or community affiliations. In that capacity, she has testified before British, Congressional and Irish government hearings, made submissions to governments and the United Nations, researched high- and low-profile human rights violations, and made third party interventions in domestic and international courts. In 2007 she was awarded the Beacon Prize for Northern Ireland, in 2008 the Irish World’s Damien Gaffney Award, and in 2009 British Irish RIGHTS WATCH won the new Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe’s Human Rights Prize for outstanding civil society action in the defence of human rights in Europe.
After taking her degree in Social Anthropology, Jane Winter worked as a researcher in two London Social Services Departments, where she studied the needs of children, the mentally handicapped and the elderly. She then moved to Battersea Law Centre where she was a caseworker in welfare rights, employment and immigration. After that she ran Wandsworth Citizens Advice Bureau for five years, then became a welfare rights consultant for the CAB service in London. From 1990 until 1995 she was the Project Co-ordinator for the Public Law Project, which promotes access to public law remedies such as judicial review for the disadvantaged. Throughout her working life she has taught and published practical guides on rights issues, such as fuel rights, community care, and human rights.
Jane Winter retired in December 2012 and is now a full-time writer looking for an agent and/or publisher.