Sir Rodney Walker

Biographical Details

Sir Rodney was born on the 10th April 1943, is married to Anne and they have two sons, Alexander and Timothy.
In the Birthday Honours published in June 1996 the honour of Knight Bachelor was conferred upon him by the Queen for services to sport.

In 2007 First Wakefield awarded Sir Rodney, its inaugural Life Time Achievement Award in recognition of his services to the City, Sport, Business and for leading campaigns which have raised an estimated £40 million for a variety of charities and good causes.

In 2008 he was awarded The Yorkshire Man of the Year.

Current Roles and Responsibilities

Sir Rodney has been Chairman of Goals Soccer Centres Plc since 2002. Goals is an operator of five-a-side soccer centres throughout Scotland and England, with 42 sites operational, further sites under development and with a long term “roll out” programme which envisages new openings each year for the foreseeable future. The company has recently set up a joint venture in the USA & has licensed the Goals name into South Africa, Northern Ireland & the Republic of Ireland.

In 2011 Sir Rodney became controlling shareholder & chairman of Sport Pathways Ltd a Yorkshire based company formed to develop sporting related opportunities in Oman & China. This led to the formation of a joint venture with the Oman Football Association, Victory Sports LLC, which Sir Rodney has been asked to chair. This new company has created a new sports brand TAJ & is now proceeding to supply a wide range of sporting goods under the new brand into Oman & the wider region. Several commercial opportunities are presently under active negotiation in China, Thailand, Scandinavia & Russia.

Sir Rodney is chairman of Lightsong Media Ltd a company formed to pursue commercial opportunities in the music industry, in particular, to work with the renowned composer & conductor Tolga Kashif on a range of new works.

Sir Rodney is the controlling shareholder of Myerscough Holdings Ltd. Group companies are involved in property development, management, investment & architecture.

At the request of Wakefield Trinity RLFC & Wakefield MDC, Sir Rodney has taken on the chairmanship of The Wakefield & District Community Stadium Trust. The trust is intending to arrange the funding for a new £13 million, 12,000 capacity stadium & associated facilities to serve the Wakefield community.

He is a trustee of the London Marathon Charitable Trust, Vice Chairman of theWembley National Stadium Trust, Vice President of the Youth Charter for Sport and vice President of the Federation of Disability Sports Organisations.

He was a Vice Chairman of the NSPCC Full Stop Appeal and was chair of the Sports Steering Group which raised £25 million for the campaign. He has recently been elected an Honorary Member of the Society in recognition of his contribution to the charity.

He is Vice Chairman of the Yorkshire Sculpture Park & the Yorkshire Landscape Trust Ltd and was Chairman of Art Transpennine ’98.

He is Honorary Life President of the Wakefield Theatre Trust, and led the campaign to raise £¾m to enable the successful re-opening of the Theatre Royal and Opera House Wakefield in 1986. The Trust has now embarked on an ambitious plan to raise £8m to extend and improve the theatre. He is also President of Wakefield Little Theatre.

He is Founder and Chairman of the Committee responsible for the organization of the Yorkshire Awards Dinner, now in its twenty fourth year, at which outstanding Yorkshire people are recognized for their contribution to life in Yorkshire in a variety of spheres. The dinner has, in addition, raised £180,000 for Yorkshire-based charities.

Sir Rodney is President of the Wakefield Branch of Yorkshire Cancer Researchand was President of the £5m Yorkshire Spinal Injuries Appeal. He is Vice President of the Hospital Heartbeat Appeal which has, to date, raised £3.0 million for Yorkshire Hospitals.

He is Trustee of the National Mining Museum for England based in Yorkshire a member of the Council of the Order of St. John for South and West Yorkshire a Trustee of the St Oswald’s Charitable Trust and the Clarke Hall Farm Trust.

Sir Rodney is an Honorary Life Vice President of the Rugby Football League, an Honorary Life Member of Leicester City Plc and is a patron of The Harold “Dickie” Bird Foundation.

He is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the Institute of Directors.

Together with his wife and two sons he has formed “The Myerscough Charitable Trust” whose primary objectives are to help disadvantaged young people.

He was conferred with an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Bradford in December 1996 in recognition of his services to the county of West Yorkshire.

In 1998 he was admitted into the Order of St Lazarus of Jerusalem in recognition of his services to health in the UK. He is an honorary member of the Rotary Club of Wakefield.

Previous Roles

A member of the Wakefield Health Authority from 1982 to 1990, he also served as founder Chairman of the Bradford Hospitals NHS Trust from 1990 until his retirement in March 1996. Sir Rodney served as Chairman, then President of the NHS Trust Federation from 1993-97.

He was Chairman of West Yorkshire Broadcasting plc (Radio Aire / Magic 828) for 17 years from 1985 to 2002.

He served as a Magistrate on the Wakefield bench for eleven years between 1981 and 1992.