The Public Affairs Conference

His career has included positions as a parliamentary assistant to several MPs and shadow ministers, covering public sector and constitutional reform and as a special adviser in three government departments, working with two Cabinet Ministers, including at the Cabinet Office and Communities & Local Government (CLG). He was a consultant to the London Borough of Lewisham for three years, working as head of communications alongside the Mayor and Cabinet. He also worked as a consultant for the London Borough of Waltham Forest, and briefly for the London Borough of Barnet.

Paul has provided training and consultancy to a variety of UK government departments and agencies including the Home Office, HMRC, DWP, Office for National Statistics, DECC, and Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM). As a temporary civil servant, he headed up the communications unit for the Neighbourhood Renewal Unit (NRU). Paul’s international work includes a project in northern Iraq working with Iraqi Parliamentarians, and for DfID officials in South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Ghana and Pakistan. He has run courses in London for civil servants from across the globe, including Vietnam, India, China and many African countries.

Paul is the author of four books on public policy and political themes, as well as several policy pamphlets. He was chair of the Fabian Society, the world’s oldest think tank. He was a parliamentary candidate in the 1997 and 2001 general elections. Paul Richards regularly appears on radio and TV, including Newsnight, the Today Programme and Sky News, and has written for many newspapers and magazines including the Times, Guardian, Independent, Financial Times, Mirror, Mail on Sunday, and the Spectator. Paul is married with two sons, and lives in Sussex by the sea.

Lord Lansley served as Conservative MP for South Cambridgeshire from 1997-2015. For 13 years he was a member of the Cabinet or Shadow Cabinet.  Following his retirement from the Commons, he was elevated to the House of Lords on October 2015.

As Leader of the House of Commons and Lord Privy Seal, he led the implementation of the Government’s legislative programme and managed the day-to-day business of the House. He served as Secretary of State for Health from 2010-2012.  Prior 2019, he was Shadow secretary of state for over six years and shadow minister for the Cabinet office.  He was a civil servant from 1979 – 1987, and Deputy Director – General of the British Chamber of Commerce 1987 – 1990.

Andrew lives with his wife Sally and family in Cambridgeshire, his former constituency.

He was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire in 2016.

Twitter: @AndrewDLansley

Dr. Hannah White is the Deputy Director at the Institute for Government, a position she has held since 2014. Formerly, she was Head of Secretariat for the Committee on Standards in Public Life, Cabinet Office (2012-14); Private Secretary to the Clerk of the House of Commons (2009-2011) and Senior Clerk, House of Commons (2004-2009).

Twitter: @DrHannahWhite

Laura is the current Chair of Women in Public Affairs, which aims to bring together women from across all areas of the public affairs industry to enable networking, build friendships and provide support, advice and training for women at all levels in the industry. She joined the Royal Bank of Scotland’s public affairs team in 2020 after almost a decade in consultancy, first at Newington and then at FTI Consulting. Earlier in her career she spent time working in Whitehall at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and as a political journalist at Total Politics magazine and news website PoliticsHome. In 2019 she was listed as “One to Watch” in Brummell Magazine.

When not tweeting about politics and current affairs, she is normally musing about London’s food scene or shopping. She holds a PPE degree from the University of Oxford.

Twitter: @lcsainsbury

Jo Campion is the Deputy Director of Campaigning and Advocacy at the National Deaf Children’s Society and Deaf Child Worldwide. She runs national campaigns at the charity,  the leading UK charity working with deaf children and their families. She is an experienced political campaigner, with a background in disability rights both in the UK and around the world. 

Jo has been with the National Deaf Children’s Society for 11 years, and before this promoted disability rights in Sri Lanka and the Maldives, developing and implementing the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities. She began her career at Leonard Cheshire Disability, has an MA in Human Rights and International Development, and spent an interesting year working in Parliament, supporting MPs and doing research in the House of Commons Library.

Twitter: @NDCS_UK

Carolyn Harris has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Swansea East since the general election in May 2015. She was elected the first ever Deputy Leader of Welsh Labour on the 21 April 2018.

Carolyn has led many successful campaigns during her time in Parliament. These have included campaigns on children's funerals, fixed-odds-betting terminals and fires in people's homes caused by electricity. Notably, following a two-year campaign to reduce the maximum stake on fixed-odds-betting terminals from £100 per spin to £2, on 17 May 2018 the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport announced that they would be reducing the stake in line with Harris's suggestion of £2 a spin.

Twitter: @carolynharris24

Neil Coyle is the Labour MP for Bermondsey and Old Southwark and was elected to Parliament in 2015.  He serves on the Work and Pensions Select Committee and has been pressing the Government on welfare reform for Universal Credit and PIP payments; he set up the All Party Parliamentary Group on Foodbanks, and is the co-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Ending Homelessness. Neil has a specific interest in mental health, disability and Universal Credit and consistently opposed Brexit, voting against triggering Article 50.  Before being elected to Parliament, Neil was a councillor for the London Borough of Southwark from 2010-2016, serving as the Deputy Mayor of Southwark between 2014-2015. Prior to this, he ran a charity helping half a million disabled people and carers every year. 

Twitter: @coyleneil

Julian Enoizi is CEO of Pool Re. Julian has presided over the repositioning of the organisation including the renegotiation of Pool Re’s relationship with HM Treasury, introduction of a more sophisticated underwriting proposition requiring an amendment to an Act of Parliament, the purchase of the world’s largest terrorism retrocession programme, the launch of the world’s first terrorism Catastrophe Bond and a significant investment into a partnership with the Home Office in respect of risk mitigation projects. 

He sits on the Advisory Board of the OECD International Network on the Financial Management of Large-scale Catastrophe and the CBI’s Financial Services Council.  A Freeman of the City of London, Julian was appointed a visiting Professor at the University of Cranfield in 2018 and in 2019 was recognised by Insurance Day as Industry Achiever of the year for his leadership and innovation in terrorism reinsurance.

Twitter: @PoolReinsurance

Margaret Ambrose heads up Public Affairs and Public Relations at national education charity Young Enterprise and Young Money, since 2015.  Prior to that she was at HM Treasury in charge of negotiating EU insurance legislation. She has held a number of advocacy, policy and media roles on both the buy and sell side for the private sector, government sector and charity sector - including as a staffer at the European Parliament in Brussels, policy development at the Financial Conduct Authority, in-house advocacy manager at an international bank and public affairs consultant.

Twitter: @youngenterprise and @YoungMoneyEdu

Rocky is External Affairs Manger at the National Farmers’ Union, previously holding the position of  Acting Head of External Affairs and leading the organisation’s Westminster office. He overseers the NFU’s award-winning ‘Back British Farming’ campaign, its legislative engagement and political events, including the organisation’s multi award-winning party conference exhibition stands.

He has previously worked at EEF (now MakeUK) as Head of Government Affairs & Stakeholder Engagement, and has also worked in a communications role in the construction sector, with stints in consultancy and in parliament earlier in his career. He studied British Politics and Legislative Studies at Hull University, and also has a Master’s degree in politics and an MBA.

Twitter: @rockylorusso

Laura Hutchinson is Head of UK Business and Political Intelligence at Dods, focussing on Brexit, Foreign Affairs, Home Affairs and International Development. Prior to joining to Dods in 2018, she worked in Parliament as a Senior Researcher for four years focussing on domestic issues, counter extremism and Brexit. She has appeared on TV, radio and podcasts.

Twitter: @LauraHutch_Dods

Rachael is a communications professional specialising in government engagement having worked for industry leading companies across a number of sectors from engineering and defence to publishing and professional services. She has led several international change communication campaigns supporting organising through times of M&A and disposal activity, significant restructuring and crises as well as working on business-as-usual and strategic campaigns.

Rachael is a passionate campaigner for the professionalisation and recognition of communications practioners and ethical lobbying practices.