Pioneering barrister and social entrepreneur whose remarkable career ranged from immigration adviser to TV presenter and Labour councillor
It all began over a bottle of claret in a City wine bar in the early 2000s. Roger Warren Evans, a social entrepreneur and barrister, was lamenting with his solicitor friend Stephen Lloyd the low profile of the not-for-profit sector.
As the evening wore on, the two lawyers developed the idea of creating an organisation that served the public interest but was not subject to the strict governance controls of a charity. Out of their conversation emerged what became known as community interest companies (CICs). There are now more than 37,000 registered in the UK.
For Warren Evans, who has died aged 89, it was one of the crowning achievements of an extraordinarily varied career that ranged across pioneering legal cases, building homes, being a government adviser and supporting asylum seekers.
The wine bar discussion prompted him to write a pamphlet promoting the idea. The key features were restrictions on the distribution of dividends so that funds are recycled back to the community, and an asset lock preventing the organisation’s holdings being removed for personal gain. It was a way of reversing the trend of privatising mutual organisations that became popular under Margaret Thatcher’s government.
The proposal, building on the experience of charities, co-operative societies and community enterprises, was well received by Tony Blair’s Labour government and incorporated into the Companies (Audit, Investigations And Community Enterprise) Act 2004. The original aim had been to call them public interest companies – but that title had already been adopted for another government scheme.
Born in Mumbles, near Swansea, Roger was the son of Thomas, variously a barrister, harbour master and bank manager, and Mary (nee Cann), a science teacher who loved painting.
During the second world war, in 1942, Roger, his sister, Eleanor, and mother were dispatched across the Atlantic. Another ship in their convoy also carrying evacuees was torpedoed by U-boats. That experience and his time in Canada generated a lifetime’s sympathy for the plight of refugees.
