Highways Agency - Safe roads, Reliable journeys, Informed travellers

Highways Agency Board

L-R: Stephen Dauncey, Tracey Barlow, Derek Turner, Simon Sheldon-Wilson, Graham Dalton,
Alan Cook, Ginny Clarke, Nirmal Kotecha, Tim Walton, David Hughes.

Alan Cook - Non Executive Chairman

Alan has many years of experience in financial services and has worked in both the private and public sectors. He is a non-executive Board member at DfT and a non-executive Director of the Financial Ombudsman Service and the Office of Fair Trading. He was formerly Managing Director of the Post Office, Chief Executive Officer of National Savings & Investments and Chief Operating Officer of Prudential.
 
Alan's role will involve him agreeing our performance measures for 2011-12 as part of the Agency's annual business plan. He will also provide valuable input to other measures, including agreeing the terms of reference for the forthcoming independent review to determine whether we have the most appropriate approach to operating, maintaining and enhancing the strategic road network.

Graham Dalton - Chief Executive

Graham Dalton was appointed as the Chief Executive of the Highways Agency in June 2008. 

Graham has a background in civil engineering in both public and private sectors. Prior to his appointment Graham was Director of Projects, National Networks, in the Department for Transport and responsible for the delivery of major rail investment projects including Channel Tunnel Rail Link, West Coast Route modernisation and Thameslink. Graham is a fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers.

Ginny Clarke - Director Network Services

Ginny Clarke was appointed to the Board in 2001 and is responsible for Technical Services, Procurement, Network Performance and Planning, Communications and Customer Relations. Her directorate also leads the Agency's research and development programme. Ginny is the Agency's Chief Highway Engineer and Board Champion for Diversity and Health and Safety. Ginny is a fellow of the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation.

Derek Turner - Director Network Delivery and Development and Deputy Chief Executive

Derek Turner, a Chartered Civil Engineer, was appointed in April 2005 and as the Director of Network Delivery & Development leads teams who plan, manage and maintain over £85bn worth of public assets, including the traffic technology, for road users. He is also responsible for resilience of the network, spatial and emergency planning and national crisis management for the Agency.

Previously the Managing Director of Transport for London Street Management, Derek was responsible for the design, introduction and operation of Central London's unique congestion charging scheme. 

Nirmal Kotecha - Director Major Projects

Appointed as Major Projects Director in 2008, Nirmal Kotecha is responsible for delivering all national infrastructure improvements and renewals on our network. He also develops new projects for future delivery and ensures that the strategic road network continues to perform during construction phases and that all major projects achieve value for money.

Nirmal is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Purchasing & Supply and has over 25 years experience of working with other large infrastructure clients across a number of sectors including  gas, water,  food  processing and high street retailing. Nirmal previously  headed up Anglian Water's supply chain management function and was also a Director of Anglian 's Capital Delivery Alliance Organisation with accountability for delivering Anglian's Major Projects between 2004-2008.

Stephen Dauncey - Director Finance Services

Stephen Dauncey was appointed as the Finance Director for the Highways Agency in February 2009, having previously been the Agency's Finance Director in what is now Network Delivery and Development. Stephen is a Certified Accountant with a wide range of operational experience.

In addition to managing all aspects of the Agency's finances, Stephen's directorate is responsible for the delivery of efficient and effective corporate services within the Agency.  This includes our Human Resources division, information & communication technologies (ICT), strategy & planning and property & business management

Stephen has had a number of Board roles including Magnox Electric and AWE Management Ltd. He undertook a number of roles in British Nuclear Fuels plc including Head of Internal Audit and four years at Sellafield in Cumbria working for the THORP business group as a financial controller.

Simon Sheldon-Wilson - Director Traffic Management

Simon Sheldon-Wilson joined the Highways Agency in December 2007 and was appointed Director of Traffic Management on 1 February 2010. Simon is responsible for the Agency's Traffic Officers, National Traffic Operations Centre and Regional Control Centres providing incident response, traffic information and active management of traffic flows.

Simon's previous career was with RAC Rescue. During this time he has been responsible for developing and delivering the organisations customer service strategy, including consolidation of operations centres and the development of new working arrangements and implementation of new operational systems.

Non Executive Directors:

David Hughes

David Hughes is a chartered accountant and a former senior partner with Arthur Andersen and has extensive expertise and experience in financial reporting, accounting, auditing, risk management and corporate governance. David was formerly the client service and audit partner for a number of major engineering and construction companies. He is also a consultant to Chubb Insurance and LECG and acts as an expert witness on accounting and auditing matters.

David currently chairs the Highways Agency's Audit Committee.

Tracey Barlow

Tracey Barlow has extensive operations and customer services experience, culminating as General Manager Network Operations for multi utility services for the North West of England. Tracey was Transition Manager for the first water industry operations outsourcing contract involving Welsh Water and United Utilities Plc.

Currently, Tracey is an independent consultant specialising in business development. She also runs project management and business improvement training programmes. She is chairman of a Waste to Energy technology business and has recently been appointed as a Board member of the Office of Rail Regulation.

Tim Walton

Tim is an experienced non-executive director and independent consultant. He has been a board member of NHS Direct since 2007, and chairs two sub-committees of the NHS board.  He is a board member of the Accent Group where he chairs the audit committee. He is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the British Computer Society, bringing valuable expertise in operations and programme management, ICT and Strategic Information Systems.
 
Previously he spent nearly 30 years with Rolls-Royce Group plc in general management including roles as a director of subsidiary companies and most recently in IT enabled business transformation as Director of e-Business.  Latterly has been Chief Information Officer of Arup and a non executive director at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.