New presidential team

Maureen Le Marinel has been elected president of UNISON for the next 12 months. She was elected at the first meeting of the union's national executive council after last week's national delegate conference.

Ms Le Marinel is branch secretary of the Lancashire police branch and is the union's first gay president.

Lucia McKeever, a nursing assistant and branch secretary of Armagh Dungannon health branch, is the new senior vice-president, having been elected to the presidential team last year.

She is the first woman from Northern Ireland to hold this position since the union was formed in 1993.

They are joined by North Yorkshire County Council branch secretary Wendy Nichols as the junior vice-president - making this the union's first-ever all-woman presidential team.