Victor Adebowale, Baron Adebowale

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Victor Olufemi Adebowale, Baron Adebowale, CBE (born 21 July 1962) is the Chief Executive of the charity Turning Point and was one of the first to become a People's Peer.

Adebowale joined Turning Point as Chief Executive in September 2001. Turning Point is the UK’s leading social care organisation and provides services for people with complex needs, including those affected by drug and alcohol misuse, mental health problems and those with a learning disability. Turning Point runs projects in 244 locations across England and Wales and last year had contact with 130,000 people. In addition to providing direct services, Turning Point also campaigns nationally on behalf of those with social care needs.

Adebowale was born to Ezekiel Adebowale and Grace and was educated at Thornes House School, Wakefield and the Polytechnic of East London. He began his career in Local Authority Estate Management before joining the housing association movement. He spent time with Patchwork Community Housing Association and was Regional Director of the Ujima Housing Association, Britain’s largest black-led housing association. He was Director of the Alcohol Recovery Project and then Chief Executive of youth homelessness charity Centrepoint before taking up his current post.

Adebowale was a member of the Social Exclusion Unit’s Policy Action Team on Young People and was Chair of the Review of Social Housing Co-ordination by the Institute of Public Policy Research.

Adebowale divides his time between a wide range of influential policy-making bodies. He is involved in a number of taskforce groups, advising the government on mental health, learning disability and the role of the voluntary sector. He is Co-Chair of the Black and Minority Ethnic Mental Health National Steering Group and is a member of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs.

Adebowale is a patron of Rich Mix Centre Celebrating Cultural Diversity, a patron of Tomorrow’s Project and of the National College for School Leadership. He is a member of the National Employment Panel, the New Economics Foundation Board and the Institute for Fiscal Studies Council. He is also on the policy advisory board of the Social Market Foundation, and on the board of the National School of Government.

Adebowale has an honorary PhD from the University of Central England in Birmingham, an honorary doctor of letters from Lincoln University, and an honorary PhD from the University of East London. He is an honorary fellow of South Bank University and Honorary Senior Fellow in the Health Services Management Centre at the University of Birmingham.

In 2000, Adebowale was awarded the CBE in the New Year’s Honour List for services to the New Deal, the unemployed, and homeless young people. In 2001, Victor became one of the first group of people to be appointed as people's peers and chose the title Baron Adebowale, of Thornes in the County of West Yorkshire.