Petra Roberts is the Strategic Service Head for Culture, Heritage, and Libraries at Hackney Council.

Petra leads the Council’s culture, heritage, libraries, venues and film services. She leads a major change programme across Hackney’s Libraries Service, which is the first formal library review for several years that has informed a new Library strategy in 2022. 

During the Covid lockdown, Petra provided business support to local arts organisations at risk and is now leading the cultural recovery and placemaking programme with her service teams. She is a Commissioner on the LGA Culture and Local Government Commission and has set up the Mayor of Hackney’s heritage review into the naming of public spaces in response to the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement.

In 2018, Petra initiated an award-winning cohesion programme and a philanthropic legacy project that has seen the installation of the first permanent sculptures to honour the Windrush generation in the UK. 

Previously to local government, Petra worked in various roles in the voluntary and community sector, the cultural and creative industries, the National Health Service and as a grant maker at the National Lottery Fund.