Nelson Smith (credited as Nelson Taylor in Series 8) is the father of Phoenix and Harley Taylor. He was the boss of a local building company, which Phoenix went to work at for a couple of episodes during Series 7.
In the beginning, the family had problems, after Phoenix and Harley's nan died. They then decided to get back together as a family when they moved to Scotland with the school.
Later, Phoenix left Waterloo Road and moved back to Rochdale to enter into Nelson's new business.