Ailsa Spindler lives in rural Kerry with her Belgian wife, the artist and poet Agnes Boes; they have been together for 23 years. Ailsa has Irish citizenship through her Dublin-born maternal grandmother, but has lived in eight different European countries. However, they both feel that Kerry is their ‘forever’ home.

Most of Ailsa’s working life has been managing not-for-profit organisations, but she came to LGBTQ+ activism as a volunteer in the 1990s, when she helped to organise activities and campaigns for the Edinburgh Gay Women’s Group. She was a founding Board member of the ground-breaking ‘Beyond Barriers’ project in Scotland, before moving to Brussels to take up the post of ILGA-Europe’s first Executive Director. She later returned to Scotland, where she led the Equality Network. Her contribution to LGBTQ+ rights was recognised when she was awarded the Ian Dunn Award for Activism. She also served on the steering group of the SNAP research into the health needs of transsexuals, and worked as the Director (Scotland) of the Terrence Higgins Trust.

Ailsa moved to Ireland in 2020, to run Gay Project in Cork. She was also active in the Rainbow Cities Network and encouraged intersectional co-operation between Cork’s various activist groups. In 2024 she joined the Board of NXF, taking on the role of Treasurer. Her aim is to get NXF and GCN magazine on a stable, sustainable financial footing, while also speaking out for trans rights and for European co-operation.