Georgina is techUK’s Associate Director for Local Public Services

Georgina works with suppliers that are active or looking to break into the market as well as with local public services to create the conditions for meaningful transformation. techUK regularly bring together local public services and supplier community to horizon scan and explore how the technologies of today and tomorrow can help solve some of the most pressing problems our communities face and improve outcomes for our people and places.

Prior to techUK, Georgina worked for a public policy events company where she managed the policy briefing division and was responsible for generating new ideas for events that would add value to the public sector. Georgina worked across a number of portfolios from education, criminal justice, and health but had a particular interest in public sector transformation and technology. Georgina also led on developing relationships across central and local government.

Richard recently joined Oxfordshire County Council leading the newly reshaped Commercial & Procurement Service. Prior to this, he worked in central government for the Government Commercial Function and in the private sector for the John Lewis Partnership, Heathrow Airport, and British Airways.

Richard is experienced in business change, having been involved in mergers and acquisitions in the private sector and leading commercial change through machinery of government restructures in central government. Richard completed his doctorate looking at implementing change which has played a significant role in shaping his approach to leading his teams and functions through significant challenges.

George is a values-driven leader with a strong background in strategy and transformation across the housing, heritage, and charity sectors. As Director of Communities at LHC Procurement Group, she leads on social value, community impact and partner charities; placing social and community benefit at the heart of public procurement.

With a career highlights including leading the successful transfer of LHC from local authority control to an independent not-for-profit company, digital and cultural transformation, leadership of the Group’s first Social Value and Community Impact strategy, developing public sector and charity partnerships responsible for distributing over £1 million annually to local communities. With experience in ESG strategy & implementation, and place-based social value driven procurement, George brings a deep interest in how environmental and social data can support better decision-making, creating long-term value not just for organisations, but for the communities and places they serve. She is a passionate advocate for community led impact, championing inclusive, measurable outcomes that improve lives and strengthen social equity.

Rikesh Shah is a Head of Innovation Procurement Empowerment Centre – IPEC at Connected Places Catapult since October 2023. Previously, Rikesh was an Open Innovation and Open Data expert at PA Consulting, and prior to that he was the Head of Open Innovation at Transport for London where he created the organisation’s first Innovation Hub, recognised as one of the best in the public sector in Europe, and he also oversaw the organisation’s world-renowned open data initiative bringing £130m worth of value per annum.

Rikesh is a guest lecturer at the Royal College of Arts and a Mobility Tech Innovator at Harvard University. He is a non-executive advisor at Cities Today, London Transport Museum and See.Sense. He also previously served on the Mayor of London’s Smart London Board, co-chaired the Data and Digital Board at the Institute of Civil Engineering.

Lisa has been with Haringey Council for 19 years, bringing extensive procurement experience across various sectors, including care, supplies and services, and construction. Since 2018, she has successfully established and led a dedicated team responsible for managing the Council's extensive portfolio of DPS systems and frameworks, ensuring seamless engagement with stakeholders and suppliers.

In addition, Lisa leads the London Construction Programme (LCP), a virtual organisation hosted by Haringey Council, serving as a one-stop shop for public sector construction procurement. The LCP facilitates the procurement of a wide range of projects, from Professional Services to Minor and Major Works schemes across London and the Home Counties.

Now, over 50 public sector organisations are benefitting from efficient, compliant procurement processes that the LCP offers. Lisa has been instrumental in leading innovation in end-to-end procurement practices which has recently been demonstrated in the launch of LCP’s Housing Framework, which takes a unique approach to Social Value, Supporting SME’s, and bringing together the Golden Thread that runs through the Gold Standard, Construction Playbook and the Framework Alliance Contract (FAC-1).

Kieran McGaughey is a Consultant Solicitor and Procurement Law Trainer. He sits on the Executive Committee of the Procurement Lawyers’ Association (PLA) and is National Lead for Procurement Law within Lawyers in Local Government (LLG).

Over his career to date Kieran has assisted various councils, combined authorities and education clients with navigating the public procurement rules. This has included work in the waste, transport, education and social care sectors.

A keen commentator on procurement law matters, Kieran’s articles are regularly featured in the sector press. He speaks frequently at events on procurement law matters, including the Westminster Policy Forum and Oxford University Procurement of Government Outcomes club. Kieran also chairs the annual LLG Commercial Law Conference.

In recent years, Kieran’s legal training offering has saw him deliver training on the Procurement Act to thousands of public sector delegates.

As Framework Director at Procure Partnerships Framework, Faye supports the team of regional Key Account Managers to advise public sector bodies on compliant and procurement routes to appoint their main contractor partners. Faye also works closely with Social Value and Marketing to ensure public sector bodies have substantial support from procurement to onsite delivery.

Faye is also responsible for ensuring a smooth transition from contractor procurement, to contractor appointment, to starting on site by organising the likes of project launch workshops and collaborative planning workshops, and external training sessions.

Darren Knowd has over 30-years’ experience of senior Procurement and Social Value roles in both the global private sector and public sector.

Darren commenced his career at General Motors Ltd in Liverpool as a graduate commercial apprentice before moving to Nissan Motor Manufacturing in Sunderland and became the Purchasing Manager at Nissan Europe and held senior roles in Barcelona, Paris offices and the European vehicle design company in Cranfield in the UK.

He studied a master’s degree in business administration (MBA) at Durham University Business School before leading five local government district Councils and merging eight Council procurement teams into a centralised team at the new unitary Durham County Council.

In 2021 he became Head of Procurement, Sales and Business Services and led a team of 700 employees consisting of £700 million of procurement spend, £25 million of commercial sales, and £15 million of people resources providing business administration and project services to the Council.

He initiated and led a collaborative place-based social value project “The County Durham Pound” working collaboratively with ten County Durham based organisations and won a national social value award as the “Best Public Sector Social Project” in 2023.

He became Chair of the Local Government Association (LGA) National Advisory Group (NAG) in 2020 and led procurement nationally during the pandemic working together with national colleagues and several central government departments, and as LGA NAG Chair he contributed to Cabinet Office Procurement Policy, the National Procurement Policy Statement and the new Procurement Act 2023.

Rapheal Balogun is a Quality Practitioner at Laing O’Rourke, currently working on the HS2 Old Oak Common project—one of the UK’s most significant infrastructure developments. In his role, Rapheal supports the implementation of robust quality management systems, ensuring compliance with industry standards and driving continuous improvement across project delivery.

He works closely with multidisciplinary teams to uphold Laing O’Rourke’s commitment to excellence, innovation, and sustainability in construction. Rapheal is passionate about embedding quality practices that enhance operational performance and deliver long-term value to stakeholders.

Christopher Hammond is the Chief Executive for UK100. UK100 is a cross-party membership organisation that supports the most ambitious councils to go further and faster on their Net Zero and Clean Air targets.

Since joining in 2021, the network has doubled and launched two new ambitious programmes. The Climate Leadership Academy and Local Power in Action. In 2023, the Membership Team which he created, was shortlisted for ‘Team of the Year’ in the Edie Sustainable Leadership Awards.

Previously, Christopher served as the elected Leader of Southampton City Council from 2018-2021. During his tenure as a councillor (2013-2022), he brokered an agreement that led to the country’s first commercial Shore Power facility and devised a Green City Charter subsequently signed by 75 major city organisations. In 2020, he was shortlisted for ‘Leader of the Year’ at the LGIU Councillor Awards.

Born and raised in Dagenham in East London, Christopher was the first of his family to graduate from university. Afterwards, he worked as a race equality advocate and governance and risk manager for Nationwide Building Society. In 2018 he established an award-winning restaurant in Southampton. Christopher holds a degree from Bournemouth University, which named him its 2019 Alumni of the Year.

As Head of Social Value at McConnell, Julian brings 24 years of experience in the construction and housing sectors, with a proven track record of delivering meaningful outcomes. He has managed social value portfolios for clients worth over £1 billion, developing bespoke offers for tenders that drive both business success and community impact. Recognised with 22 industry awards — including the Social Value Leadership Group Awards 2024 and the Social Value Awards 2022 — he is widely recognised and has built a reputation for delivering on promises and creating innovative, high-impact social value strategies.

Sarah Cawthorne is an Assistant Director in the Competition Enforcement team within the Competition and Markets Authority. She is currently leading an investigation into conduct in the housebuilding sector, and has previously worked on a range of competition law cases involving digital and pharmaceutical markets.

Sarah joined the CMA in 2020, after completing a PhD at the University of York. She now works from the CMA’s Greater Manchester office in Salford, where she was one of the first members of staff. During her time at the CMA she has been involved in phases across the lifecycle of a regulatory investigation, including dawn raids, case launch, complex evidence reviews, issuing infringement decisions, accepting legally binding commitments, and successfully defending a CMA decision on appeal.

Rommell Wallace has worked for over 20 years within the Community/Voluntary sector helping unemployed people of all ages and backgrounds into work. In 2010 he founded youth-focused social enterprise, Serious About Youth (SAY), with close friend Paul Matthews, which enhances the employability and life skills of young people, particularly those from BAME and disadvantaged backgrounds, to support them into positive outcomes.

One of SAY's flagship programme is the 'Construkt' programme, which is a construction-focused employability programme that helps underrepresented young people into the wide range of roles within the sector that they are often unaware of. SAY has also worked with a number of key partners such as the LCP Haringey Framework, TfL/Places for London, the Greater London Authority (GLA/Mayor of London), London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC), the Supply Chain Sustainability School, and CITB to enhance diversity and inclusion (D&I) practices on construction sites to improve the wellbeing and retention of workers from all backgrounds.

Philippa leads our client engagements, building strong relationships with leaders and teams. She works across the UK public sector, navigating complex challenges and bringing clarity to organisations and their transformation journey. Philippa has supported engagements including the UK Space Agency, Arts Council, Thurrock Council and the Stroke Association, where she has helped them to develop new operating conditions, organisational values and behaviours, and embed a service-led approach to delivery.

Prior to joining Public Digital, Philippa was Head of Delivery at Royal Borough of Greenwich, where she led the modernisation of the Council's infrastructure, including a transition to cloud hosting. She was responsible for steering Greenwich’s first borough-wide digital inclusion strategy, initiating a local government community of practice designed to improve the evaluation of digital inclusion programmes. Working closely with procurement leaders, she also led on the creation of new governance mechanisms at Greenwich and Hackney Councils based on user centred and agile principles.

Pat started his career working as a client for a leading G15 Housing Association, working his way up to senior positions. This experience proves invaluable when working and collaborating with Clients. Pat’s experience includes in the procurement and mobilisation of various large-scale contracts, including a £100m decent homes contract, and contract management for gas, fire, and legionella compliance contracts.

After moving over to the contracting side, which includes holding a Divisional Director role with the McConnell team, Pat has demonstrated his client-focused approach and has recent experience delivering fire remediation schemes to the value of £55m for various Clients.

Mark is a lawyer who advises people and organisations on how to work together across the public, private and civil society sectors. He is a leading expert in sustainable procurement, with a particular track record in enabling social value to be a core feature in the delivery of public services. He provides strategic advice on models for transforming public services, using the law to create flexible routes for achieving change.

Denis is a Founder, Entrepreneur, Strategic Director and Board Member with over 20 years’ experience across multiple industries, sectors and markets. Immediately following his MBA, he founded Arcus Global Limited (AGL), a SaaS company working in the regulation technology and government technology spheres in the UK. He is also a member of techUK’s Local Public Services Committee.

Simon joined CLES in September 2025 having worked in local government for more than 15 years, in roles spanning policy and performance, research and intelligence, regeneration, economic development and community wealth building, including through a community-led CWB partnership called Owned by Oxford.

He recently led a project with the Cooperative Councils Innovation Network (CCIN), looking at how flexibilities in procurement and commissioning can be applied to community wealth building and cooperative placemaking. He has published and presented widely on progressive procurement and community wealth building.

NEPO undertakes high-value procurement in major strategic areas of spend (such as construction, energy, and facilities management) on behalf of North East local authorities and a range of associate members from the wider UK public sector.

At every step of our procurement journey, we collaborate with a wide range of stakeholders to ensure that their needs are understood and met. So whether you are a public sector colleague, a supplier interested in doing business with us, or an end-user using the goods and services we procure, you can rest assured that we are procuring for you.

Naomi is a business development and contract management professional for corporate eyecare services at Specsavers. She led and developed bids, tenders and grants in the charity sector for seven years before making the switch to Specsavers in 2022 to focus on public sector contracts and account management for eyecare. She specialises in working with the public sector and driving contract engagement through social initiatives.

Guy has over two decades of experience working across local and central government, the NHS, emergency services, educational and the third sector. Having started his career working in Parliament and then representing organisations in Westminster, Guy was Head of Public Sector Sales for Vodafone and is now leading Gett's Public Sector team - focused on bringing the very best technology to public sector organisations delivering SEND transport, non-emergency patient transport and other core services across the UK.

Chris has 25 years of combined military and civilian security experience, specialising in property protection and the delivery of effective solutions for clients. Chris served in the Grenadier Guards for seven years and saw active operational service in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan. Since leaving the British Army in 2008 he has focused on supporting veterans through employment and to date has created jobs for over 1,000 veterans across a variety of different start-ups he has formed.

Kartik Bharadia represents Specsavers UK as a Clinical Performance Consultant. With a background in Optometry, business leadership, and professional development. Kartik brings deep insight into clinical delivery and operational strategy across NHS partnerships and community eye care.

Delta eSourcing is an end-to-end, EU compliant, full eSourcing web-based service which allows buying organisations to manage tenders, suppliers and contracts in a single solution.

Our eTendering portal is at the forefront of eProcurement technology for the public sector, and offers all users outstanding customer support and guidance.

Delta allows public sector buyers a chance to build communities, enjoy benefits of collaboration and transparency as well as meeting with an ever changing legislative landscape. Intelligent forms allow users to comply with legislation and at the same time allows our customers the ability to outperform their market.

Tracker aims to empower suppliers to achieve their public sector strategy with ease and confidence. With features spanning from market and industry insights, to advanced analytical reporting, and unique spend analysis data, Tracker Intelligence is more than just a tenders platform.

Matthew is a senior researcher in the devolution team. He previously worked on the public services team as one of the authors of the IfG CIPFA Performance Tracker.

Matthew has a PhD on the origins of national income accounting. Before university he worked as an intern for an MP and later scrutinised the value for money of government programmes at the National Audit Office. He joined the Institute in June 2022 from a secondment to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee at the House of Commons.