Department for Culture, Media and Sport
Anna Carragher has forty years of experience working in the public service in both executive and non executive roles. She was brought up in Belfast and attended Queens University where she took an Honours degree in English Literature and had the great privilege of being taught by Seamus Heaney. After graduating she joined the BBC and worked across radio and television producing a range of news and current affairs programmes including Today and Any Questions on Radio Four and Man Alive, Question Time and Newsnight on BBC television. She returned to Northern Ireland as Head of Programmes in 1995 and oversaw output throughout the peace negotiations and the establishment of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Among the programmes she commissioned as Head of Programmes were Give My Head Peace, PK Tonight , Hearts and Minds, the Stephen Nolan Show and the Legacy series on Radio Ulster, which won a Sony Gold Award for Services to the Community. She became Controller, BBC Northern Ireland in 2001 with editorial and managerial responsibility for the Corporation in Northern Ireland; during her time as Head of Programmes and Controller audience numbers increased and BBC NI programmes won record number of industry awards including RTS Awards, BAFTA, an Oscar nomination and Sony Radio Awards, including both Radio Ulster and Radio Foyle winning Station of the Year.
After leaving the BBC she was the Chair of the Grand Opera House Trust. She also served as a member of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority and was a Commissioner for the Equality Commission of Northern Ireland. She is a member of the Board of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and is the Electoral Commissioner for Northern Ireland and a Trustee of the Wildfowl and Wetland Trust.
She has been appointed for a term of three years, from the 7th of October 2016 until the 6th of October 2019. The role attracts 20,749 per annum.
The appointment has been made in accordance with the OCPA Code of Practice. It is a requirement of the Code that political activity by those appointed is declared. Anna Carragher has declared no such political activity.