Anne Marie has extensive experience of social care extending over 30 years in different settings and in a range of service areas. She has held a number of senior management roles for over 15 years, delivering and leading service delivery and significant transformational change.

Currently, as the Director of Adult Care, Housing and Public Health, Anne Marie is accountable for a net budget of £75 million as well as £83m of Council Housing income and expenditure, inclusive of managing to two large people directorates. In this role, she is responsible for developing a clear vision and focus on delivery and performance and particularly within the housing and housing growth. Rotherham Council is one of the largest social housing landlords – 21,500. Aligning the Housing, Social Care and Public Health agenda has been pivotal in this role and has provided a range of benefits from a place and population health. Key to her role is to ensure that a complex efficiency agenda is achieved, whilst ensuring quality and control whilst under significant public scrutiny. Additionally, it is important that this is aligned to the corporate agenda and aspirations of the Council.

Anne Marie has had the opportunity to work with a range of partnerships, for example, across complex health environments, children and young people services, housing and regeneration. As a senior leader, she is committed to the organisation and personal development and sees this as integral to any leadership role.

Allen is a life-long environmentalist. Growing up in his native Somerset he was active in establishing the Somerset Trust for Nature Conservation. He moved to Newcastle and completed the Town and Country planning degree in 1982. He has been practising as a Chartered Town Planner and Environmentalist since then: in the public sector until 1999 as Head of Sustainable Development at Newcastle City Council, and then until 2003 with the European Commission and OECD as the UK’s urban policy expert. Allen returned to Newcastle in 2003 to establish an Ethical Partnership as a planning and sustainability consultancy and is CEO. Allen is also director of SLC Property Ltd, the specialist infrastructure & rail investment and property business. Both companies work across the UK with may projects and clients in the North.

Allen is member of the Royal Town Planning Institute and Fellow of the Institute of Environmental Management. He is a Qualified ISO.9000 & 14000 lead auditor.

Allen has been an active member of the FSB since 2003. He leads its UK policy work on energy, environment and infrastructure; he is a member of the FSB’s UK Policy Committee and has policy oversight for FSB for the Midlands and North of England.

Previously working for the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, Annette brings a tremendous amount of knowledge and experience from a career that spans numerous senior positions. She will probably be best known to the research and business communities in the North from her most recent role as Head of Healthcare Technologies, where she has had particularly significant success in galvanising multidisciplinary research collaborations between researchers and between funders. She also brings to the N8 strong experience of organisational change, having played a prominent role in the successful transfer of EPSRC’s grants services to a shared service centre, including the implementation of a new IT system. Other roles in EPSRC have included Head of Mathematical Sciences, Complexity Science and Engineering.

Annette is also an artist and student at the Royal School of Needlework, graduating last year from the Certificate in Technical Hand Embroidery and is now studying for the Diploma. Her work has been exhibited by the Royal School and in galleries in the UK. She feels that her love for both the arts and the sciences are one of the reasons that she is so passionate about multidisciplinary research and bringing people together to address real-world challenges.

Raksha Pattini success throughout her career has been achieved by identifying local issues, both economic and social, and turning them into strategic opportunities and programmes. I inspire senior leaders from business, public sector and community organisations to work together for the common good.

She is a huge advocate for Responsible Business and for getting businesses engaged locally. Whilst working for a national charity Business in the Community (BITC), led on the development and implementation of significant regeneration programmes.

Her first major project successfully engaged over 60 businesses in one of the region’s most deprived areas in Preston. The resulting network, Preston Community Impact Group, was awarded the National Example of Excellence in BITC’s Collaborative Action Award and replicated by BITC across the Country including in Burnley and Manchester. 

Rakshas passion for creating positive change is supported by my extensive experience of managing change and leading multi-functional teams through complex agenda and relationship management at every level of the organisation and across sectors.

Stephen Gorard is Professor of Education and Public Policy, and Fellow of the Wolfson Research Institute at Durham University, and Honorary Professorial Fellow at the University of Birmingham. He has previously held chairs in social science and education at Cardiff and York. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a member of the ESRC Commissioning Panel for Research Seminars and Strategic Networks, and the grant-awarding panel for the British Academy, on the expert roster for 3ie – the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation, a Methods Expert for the US government Institute of Education Science, and Independent Expert for the EU Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme. He is also an evaluator/reviewer for the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development, Brazil, the Croatian Science Foundation (HRZZ), the National Center of Science and Technology Evaluation, Kazakhstan, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P. (FCT), the Portuguese public funding agency for R&D, and The Executive Agency for Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation Funding, Romania.

David joined The Open University (OU) in 2016, and now leads on the commercial strategy for the University. A key area of this is growing the OU’s work with employers. As a former, apprentice himself, David has a passion for apprenticeships and work-based learning. Since his appointment, the OU has launched successful higher and degree apprenticeship programmes in nursing, social work, policing, digital, leadership and management. Across the whole curriculum, the OU now works with over 2,400 employers and 78 of the FTSE 100 have sponsored staff on OU programmes – taking advantage of flexible, work-based learning that fits around employer needs and drives business success.

Carol Matthews has been Group Chief Executive of The Riverside Group since 2012. The Riverside Group is national with homes in 165 local authorities and a Scottish subsidiary called Irvine. In August 2018 Impact Housing based in Cumbria joined the Group.

Riverside have a strong track record in regeneration, neighbourhood management and Care and Support. The 2017-20 Corporate Plan is a step change in the level of development being committed and planned with nearly five thousand new homes over a three year period, a focus on improving neighbourhoods and service.

Carol has been in housing and customer service since 1984 starting as a housing officer with door to door rent collection as part of the role. Ten years of experience was with three local authorities: Sheffield, Burnley and Bristol before joining Northern Counties which became part of the Guinness Partnership in 2007.

Carol is Chair to H4N – ‘Homes for the North’ – a group of seventeen HAs with northern stock who want to campaign and influence development and regeneration in the north.

Guy Battle is a Sustainability Consultant with over 25 years of experience. Guy originally trained as an engineer and much of his early career was focused within the real estate industry, during which time he worked on many award-winning projects with internationally renowned architects. More recently, Guy was the lead partner for Sustainability at Deloitte LLP, where he worked closely with many corporates helping them solve some of the key sustainability challenges facing the world of corporate business. In September 2014, Guy set up The Sustainable Business Partnership and is now focused on unlocking the inherent social, environmental and financial opportunities that businesses should do to create value. In spring 2014, Guy supported Hazel Blears MP with a review of The Public Services (Social Value) Act with a series of cross-party recommendations to Cabinet Office. Guy is passionate about the contribution that Business can make to improve our society and this has been one of the driving motivations behind the creation of The Social Value Portal.

Phillip Thomas, overseeing policy and strategy development for the UK government’s ambitious and high-profile programme for “levelling up” the North of England. Building and maintaining strategic relationships with Whitehall, LEPs, Mayoral Combined Authorities, businesses, universities, think-tanks, NGOs and other key local and national stakeholders to pursue an ambitious strategy for transforming the North of England. Leading the development of a robust Northern Powerhouse Strategy using both bottom-up and top-down approaches. Driving collaboration across Whitehall to align policies and strategies so that a coherent and joined up government response for the North is developed.

Chris becks is responsible for the innovation, business growth, inward investment, adult education, skills and school careers activities within the combined authority. Focusing on key priorities including decarbonisation, clean growth and digital we are responsible for ensuring the region has the right skills base, innovation infrastructure and business support to grow and attract high-quality business to the region and that the local population have the skills and opportunities to work within and benefit from business growth. He also works with the NP11, the Northern Powerhouse, the Tees Valley LEP and central government to deliver growth in the Tees Valley. TWI Company NameTWI

Dr Phil Jennings has a dual role, as medical director for the Innovation Agency and deputy medical director for NHS England (Cheshire and Merseyside), while continuing to practice as a freelance GP in Merseyside, with a specialist interest in cardiology.

At the Innovation Agency, Phil leads on patient safety and digital health and is helping to steer a digital health strategy for the North West Coast.

He was previously the primary care lead for the Cheshire and Merseyside Cardiac Network and helped to develop the Wirral Intermediate Cardiac Clinic.

He also joined the management team of Wirral Primary Care Trust and subsequently became chairman of NHS Wirral Clinical Commissioning Group, where he led the organisation through its development and authorisation.

Guy Lucchi, a passionate believer that technology has a fundamental role to play in helping transform outcomes of patients and citizens by enabling the integration of wellness, health, social care and life sciences services. A highly proactive and result-driven individual, with a broad and deep understanding of healthcare and digital technologies who excels at managing relationships at all levels from the board room to technical experts. A creative thinker, that leads from the front, with an infectious passion to devise and deliver innovative solutions. Born and bred in Manchester, went to University in Salford and have been instrumental in shaping and delivering many of the digital platforms currently in use across the Manchester healthcare system today.

Having spent his career in the technology industry I am now committed to bringing my extensive experience closer to the patient to drive digital transformation for the direct patient and population health benefit.

Joe has received numerous research contracts from government departments, RCUK and the EU and has published more than 100 peer reviewed articles. He is currently an investigator on two Innovate UK projects, on carbon capture and storage and nuclear decommissioning respectively. He is a visiting professor at Harbin Institute of Technology and an Associate of the National Nuclear Laboratory and the British Geological Survey.

'Debbie is a scientist who held senior business roles in Teesside and then in the United States. She served as the CEO of a US-based, global electronic materials company. With husband Mike, she shares a passion for renewable energy. She is a founding member of Whitby Esk Energy, a community owned hydro-electric turbine near Whitby and is a committee member of Community Hydro Forum. Debbie has a Ph.D in Chemistry and was awarded Fellowship of the Royal Society of Chemistry for service to the Chemical Industry, and Fellowship of the Royal Society of Arts. Debbie serves as a Director of Community Energy England and of the North York Moors National Park Trust.'

Tom joined Leeds in 2002 to establish the Council’s Environment Unit after previous posts with Oxford City Council, Cherwell District Council and sustainable development specialists, CAG consultants. Tom is a full member and also served two years on the Council of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment. He is a Chartered Environmentalist and Fellow of the RSA and is currently seconded to Leeds Beckett University as a visiting researcher.

Tom’s role is concerned with achieving sustainable development, which in Leeds effectively means achieving the Council’s corporate priorities for economic, social and environmental improvement, but all at the same time rather than at the expense of each other. A significant priority in the city is attracting investment for low carbon energy infrastructure to address fuel poverty, increase competitiveness and increase resource efficiency.

The Energy Systems Catapult was established in April 2015 with the remit to support the transition of the UK Energy System and enable economic growth from the many commercial and technological opportunities that will be created as the way we make, distribute and use energy undergoes radical change over the coming decades. The scope includes the interaction of energy with adjacent sectors, including water and transport.

He is a Commissioner on the global Energy Transition Commission and a member of the Global Futures Council of the World Economic Forum. Philip is also a Fellow of the Energy Institute and sits on various Advisory Panels.

Before joining the Catapult Philip worked for BP for over 30 years in a range of commercial and general management positions, mostly in customer-facing businesses, operating in Asia, North and South America, and Europe.

Philip has an MA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from Oxford University, and lives in Oxford, the UK with his wife. His three children are now at University.

Peter has over 40 years’ experience working in local government, 13 of which have been at Chief Officer level in a multi-disciplined environment. His roles, which have mainly been in highways and transport, have included Corporate Director at Trafford Council and Head of Highways at Transport for Greater Manchester.

Councillor Nick Forbes, Leader Newcastle City Council Nick Forbes is a Labour politician and became Leader of Newcastle City Council in 2011

. Nick has made economic growth a key feature of his council, securing new financial powers by negotiating one of the first round of City Deals with government and has been instrumental in securing a devolution deal for the North of Tyne. He has played a leading role in raising the profile of local government in a time of austerity and has been involved in national lobbying efforts for successive local government finance settlements.

Current roles include vice chair of Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Authority, Vice Chair of the Core Cities Cabinet and Business Competitiveness portfolio holder for the North of Tyne Combined Authority. At a national level, Nick is the Leader of Labour in local government, heading up the Local Government Association (LGA) Labour Group, representing the views of more than 6000 Labour Councillors in Westminster. He is currently Senior Vice Chair of the LGA. He is also a member of Labour’s ruling National Executive Committee. Nick was born and brought up in the North East, graduating from Cambridge University in 1997, Sheffield Hallam University in 1999 and the Open University in 2010. He trained in the NHS and worked as Chief Executive of Involve North East, a regional health charity.

Sue Dunkerton OBE, BSc, CEng, FIMMM, is Director at the Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN), responsible for priority themes within Manufacturing, Materials, Chemistry and Industrial Biotechnology, AgriFood and Health.

KTN is the UK’s innovation network supporting the acceleration of innovation in UK businesses ultimately leading to UK wealth creation.
Sue was previously responsible for the Health KTN, whilst at the Research and Technology Organisation TWI Ltd, and prior to that had a long career in process technologies and manufacturing for a range of industry sectors spanning aerospace, materials & medtech. Sue is a chartered engineer with a specialism in materials engineering before moving into knowledge transfer and innovation in the life sciences, materials and manufacturing sectors. She was awarded the OBE in 2014, for services to health and engineering. She now works closely with UK government and particularly Innovate UK to help represent business input to future technology and innovation strategy.
Based near Manchester, Sue has a passion for supporting the North of England, STEM, diversity and inclusion and in her spare time enjoys walking, dogs and fine living! 

A lifelong Trafford resident, he is the Leader of Trafford Council and has been a local councillor representing Sale Town Centre since 2011.

Andrew’s professional background is in project management, predominantly in civil engineering specialising in supporting delivery of large scale infrastructure programmes. He has also worked on IT transformation projects including at Manchester Airport Group.

In addition to his work as Leader of Trafford Council and on Green City Region Andrew sits on the North West Regional Leaders’ Board, serves on the Board of a local mental health charity and is the Vice President of a Trafford-based youth association. Andrew is also a non-executive director of Trafford Housing Trust and is a member of the LGA Improvement and Innovation Board.

Kim Smith is the Smart Mobility lead at DG Cities where she takes a strategic overview of the various projects the team are delivering. The multidisciplinary team provides expertise in the key themes related to smart cities.

DG Cities Ltd is the commercial arm of Digital Greenwich. It enables the organisation to work flexibly with external partners in research consortia, local government, consultancy and other new business opportunities related to smart city development.

As a team, DG Cities Ltd offers a broad mix of skills in smart city strategies, urban innovation, economics & business development, sustainability, the modern built environment and technology management. Our focus areas are in the disciplines which support smart city innovation, including:

– the economics of the digital economy

– smart mobility and autonomous transport

– sustainable spatial development and integrated planning

– citizen facing services and government as a platform

– urban energy systems

– multi-city collaboration and procurement Kim's specialism is transportation with over 25 years in transport planning, policy formation and high level strategy, as well as working at an operational level managing the delivery of specialist passenger transport services.

Leading the decarbonisation of road transport in Europe and the Asia Pacific, by ensuring strategic focus on opportunities that deliver the most value and by leading sales, distributor and trading organizations to drive profitability and growth.

Accountable for the growth and profitability of Neste's global refinery sales and oil trading business, especially products business (base oils and solvents) and renewable product sales in Europe and Asia. Additionally accountable for continuous improvement of the global operations team which includes front and back-office activities. Development of Neste's strategic accounts and markets, by creating value-added offers and cross-business solutions to our customers.

Sir Merrick Cockell was appointed Chairman of the UK MBA in January 2015. He recently stepped down as Chairman of the London Pensions Authority. Sir Merrick was Chairman of the Local Government Association from 2011-2014 and London Councils 2006-2010. In addition, he chairs Localis, an independent think-tank dedicated to localist issues and is a Governor of Kensington Aldridge Academy.

Richard Crane has extensive experience of senior leadership in a number of secondary schools in North Yorkshire, Leeds and York. He has been the Headteacher of Ryedale School in North Yorkshire and The Joseph Rowntree School in York, and the Executive Headteacher of Canon Lee School for a period of time in 2016 at the request of York City Council. He is also an Ofsted Inspector.

Richard is currently Head of Education and Skills for County Durham and leads the Education Durham team which has three key teams based around Standards and Performance, CPD and Staff Development and Progression and Learning.

Vicky’s role is to monitor standards and effectiveness across academies and Trusts within the area. By doing this she works closely with a number of partners, including leaders from the education sector , Ofsted, local authorities and local dioceses.

Before her appointment, Vicky was a national leader of education and Executive principal of The West Trafford Learning Partnership (part of The Dean Trust), comprising Ashton on Mersey and Broadoak schools in Trafford.

Earlier in her career she also was

• Helped to establish and was Chair of the Teaching Schools Council (2011 to 2015) worked as an Ofsted additional inspector

• was the Director and founding member of By Schools for Schools, a system-led school improvement body serving the Greater Manchester area

Vicky Beer was awarded a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2013.”

Roger Marsh has been Chair of the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership (LEP) since 2013 and during that time has led the LEP through a period of significant transformation, including securing the country’s largest ever Local Growth Deal with Government.

Roger chairs the NP11 which brings together the 11 Northern LEPs to work with the Northern Powerhouse Minister to support the Government’s vision for the Northern Powerhouse. He is currently also a Member of the Williams Rail Review Expert Challenge Panel and Chair of both the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund Strategic Oversight Board and European Structural & Investment Fund Local Sub Committee. Before joining the LEP, Roger was Senior Partner at PwC and boasts over 30 years’ experience in the private sector. In 2015, he was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s birthday honours list for Services to Business and the Economy.

Warren started his career as a neighbourhood housing officer nearly 25 years ago. He progressed to become Stockport Council’s policy manager for health & social care supporting public health partnership developments between the council and the local NHS.

Warren joined the NHS in 2006 and has been Director of the Association of Greater Manchester PCTs (developing joint commissioning and leadership arrangements across the PCTs) and Director of Policy & External Relations for NHS Greater Manchester (supporting the transition to the new NHS arrangements).

In 2012 Warren joined NHS England as the Greater Manchester Area Team’s Director of Operations & Delivery with responsibility for performance, CCG assurance and emergency preparedness.

Since 2014 Warren has played a central role to bring devolved powers and budgets to Greater Manchester and is currently the Executive Lead Strategy and System Development for the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership.

Tim has over 24 years’ experience in railway design and delivery and previously held two Rail Director positions in the private sector. He is known for early development of Rail PPP schemes and partner and stakeholder management.

Following a Natural sciences degree at Durham University, Sarah has invested over 20 years working across global manufacturing, finance and the public sector on integrated decisionmaking, governance, strategy, innovation and reform. With work ranging from E procurement, global sustainability reporting, extrafinancial risk methods, low carbon capital programmes, and Combined Authority Strategy, she now leads the Environment Agency’s policy work on the Northern Powerhouse. One of the 2019 Northern Powerlist of Influencers, and also leading DEFRA’s Urban Pioneer, Sarah works across sectors to tackle society’s most pressing environmental challenges, and to highlight the materiality of the climate, nature and resource crises in securing inclusive, healthy and prosperous communities.

Simon Tse was appointed Chief Executive of the Crown Commercial Service in 2018. He first joined CCS in May 2016 and led the Procurement Operations directorate. He served as interim CEO from July 2018 until his permanent appointment, which followed an external competition, in December that year. Simon is an experienced Chief Executive Officer and has extensive experience in strategic planning, customer service, driving performance improvement and achieving results. He first joined the Civil Service in 2008, taking up the position of Chief Executive Officer for the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, where he remained in post until 2013. Simon was Health Director at the Department for Work and Pensions, one of the UK’s largest public service departments, from 2013 - 2016. In this role, he was responsible for the provision of all health and disability assessments services within the UK. This role followed a successful career in the private sector spanning more than 25 years, most recently at Virgin Media, firstly as Managing Director for Wales and West, and subsequently as the UK SME Business Director.

Justine Fosh is Chief Executive of The National Skills Academy for Food and Drink and Improve. Having spent 15 years working in commercial positions in food and drink manufacturing companies including Sara Lee, Grolsch, McCain and Uniq she moved to Learndirect and first entered the skills arena. She joined Improve and established their National Skills Academy before becoming Chief Executive of both businesses. Justine sits on the Executive of Scotland Food and Drink the industry leadership body for food and drink. She is a graduate in Industrial Relations and Marketing from Strathclyde University.

Cllr Hannan Sarwar was elected onto Wilmslow Town Council in May 2019 at the age of 18, becoming the UK's Youngest Muslim Councillor. Hannan's current positions include: Deputy Representative on the Manchester Airport Liaison Group and member of the Community and Order, Finance & (formerly Planning) committee.He is driven by a desire to bring about real change, Hannan is passionate about campaigning for and championing the causes of his community with a key focus on mental health and homelessness