Steering Committee
Sabine Chalmers, general counsel, BT
Sabine Chalmers is the General Counsel, Director of Regulatory Affairs and Company Secretary of BT Group Plc. BT Group is the UK’s leading provider of fixed and mobile telecommunications and related secure digital products, solutions and services. It also provides managed telecommunications, security and network and IT infrastructure services to customers across 180 countries.
Matt Wilson, general counsel, Fremantle
Matt is group general counsel at global content producer Fremantle. Fremantle produces over 12,000 hours of original programming every year across drama, entertainment, documentaries and film. He joined Fremantle in August 2021 and sits on the global board. Prior to Fremantle, Matt was general counsel for EMEA & APAC for Uber, and previously held roles at Telefonica o2, The Arsenal Football Club and Baker McKenzie.
Helen Barraclough, group GC, Smith & Nephew
Helen Barraclough is Group General Counsel, Company Secretary and Chief Risk Officer at Smith + Nephew. Helen has extensive experience navigating complex regulatory landscapes, providing strategic support to growth strategies and driving a high-performance culture. Helen’s other inhouse experience includes senior positions in WPP and Nomura International plc.
Andrew Yorston, general counsel, Vodafone
Andy Yorston joined Vodafone in 2010 and became general counsel for Vodafone UK in 2021 having previously held positions as head of legal and head of risk and compliance. Prior to joining Vodafone he was a commercial litigator at Eversheds Sutherland.
Nicki Schroeder, group GC, Reach
Nicki is group general counsel at Reach Plc, the largest newspaper publishing group in the United Kingdom, including household names such as The Mirror, The Express and OK magazine. The group also has publications in the Republic of Ireland and the US. Nicki manages a team of 20 employed legal and data protection specialists, supported by an additional ten freelance prepublication lawyers providing out of hours editorial legal cover to our publications.
Mark Gregory, general counsel, Rolls-Royce
Mark Gregory was appointed General Counsel at Rolls Royce in 2015, Mark has over twenty years of legal, regulatory, risk, compliance and governance experience and has been a member of the Executive Team ay Rolls Royce for nearly ten years. Before this role, Mark held various positions in the Group, most recently as Head of Legal and Commercial.Before joining Rolls-Royce in 2005, Mark trained and practiced at Lovells (now Hogan Lovells) in London and Hong Kong.
Huma Allana van Reesch, GC, EMEA, Starbucks
Huma Allana van Reesch sits as EMEA general counsel at Starbucks, leading a team that covers 42 markets and handles regulatory challenges, crisis and risk management while implementing strategic priorities for the group. Huma has extensive in-house experience, especially in the retail, consumer goods and health sectors, having previously worked for the likes of Coca-Cola Enterprises and Reckitt.
Stuart Brown, GC, Bupa UK
Stuart joined Bupa in February 2018 as General Counsel, UK. Stuart was formerly General Counsel and Company Secretary at Guardian Financial Services Holdings before that he was Group Legal Director at Friends Life plc. Stuart has also held senior legal counsel positions at Swiss Re (Admin Re UK) and GE Insurance Solutions. Stuart trained and qualified into the Corporate Insurance team at Clifford Chance.
Jeremy Mavor, UK GC, National Grid
Jeremy Mavor is an experienced and commercially focused executive, serving as UK general counsel to the National Grid, a position he has held since 2023. Jeremy Mavor has experience leading various transactions and initiatives from start to finish. Jeremy began his legal career at legacy firm Allen & Overy, moving in-house in 2013 to the data and content company Arqiva, where he held a number of leadership positions.
Harriet Gallagher-Powell, GC (Group Corporate), Legal & General
Harriet Gallagher-Powell is the General Counsel for Corporate & M&A and Deputy Group Company Secretary at Legal & General Group plc. Harriet leads a team of experts providing group-wide legal and governance advice on mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures, UK listed plc matters, corporate structuring and regulatory interactions.
As General Counsel – Corporate & M&A, Harriet leads on the legal execution of high-value, strategically significant transactions for the Group. Most recently, she played a central role in Legal & General’s divestment of its US protection business to Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company, and the establishment of a strategic partnership with Meiji Yasuda in US pension risk transfer, for $2.3bn – a major cross-border transaction aligned with the Group’s strategic focus on its core growth markets.
In her capacity as Deputy Group Company Secretary, Harriet leads the company secretarial team in the delivery of best-in-class corporate governance across the FTSE 100-listed financial services group. She acts as secretary to the Legal & General Group plc board and advises executive management and the PRA and FCA-regulated boards on governance, corporate structure, regulatory developments and shareholder matters.
Harriet started her legal career as a corporate M&A lawyer at Slaughter and May where she advised on complex multi-jurisdictional M&A transactions, listed corporate governance and cross-border regulatory investigations.
Blair Parker, Head of Legal Services UK and Ireland, DHL
Head of Legal Services UK and Ireland at DHL, Blair Parker has held various leadership roles at the global shipping and courier service since 2013. Blair has been instrumental in shaping the companies legal framework to ensure compliance, mitigate risk and enhancing operational efficiencies. Blair has previously worked for the likes of Coca-Cola Enterprises, Royal Mail and AkzoNobel.
Stephanie Lopes, chief legal officer, Volt
Stephanie trained at Bird & Bird London for a decade, where she assisted with a wide range of commercial matters with a focus on data commercialisation and governance, IT and technology. She has significant experience and a good understanding of the issues in these areas, having undertaken several in-house secondments at headquarters of some of the world’s largest companies. She is now chief legal officer at Volt, an open banking payments scale up.
Daniel Winterfeldt, GC, EMEA and Asia, Jeffries
Daniel Winterfeldt is the General Counsel for EMEA and Asia at Jefferies. He is a senior corporate and securities lawyer with over 25 years of experience in London and New York.
Daniel founded the Forum for US Securities Lawyers in London in 2006 to address US securities issues in the London market across law firms, banks, and intermediaries.
In 2008, Daniel founded the InterLaw Diversity Forum to promote meritocracy and inclusion for all diverse, under-represented, and socially disadvantaged groups in the legal sector. Since its founding in 2008 the InterLaw Diversity Forum has expanded its scope beyond LGBT+ to encompass all strands of diversity and inclusion, including Race & Ethnicity, Disability, Gender, and social mobility, with a particular focus on cultural change in the workplace and ‘multiple identities’/intersectionality. The InterLaw Diversity Forum currently has more than 9,000 members and supporters from over 300 law firms and chambers, and over 500 corporates and financial institutions.
In 2020 Daniel was appointed Queen’s Counsel Honoris Causa (Honorary QC) for his contributions to capital markets in England & Wales through the Forum for US Securities Lawyers in London and for his contributions to diversity, inclusion, and culture in the legal sector through the InterLaw Diversity Forum; and was awarded The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for “Services to Capital Markets, to Equality and to Diversity in the Legal Profession”.
Clare Wolley, Chief Risk and Legal Officer, RAC
Clare is Chief Risk and Legal Office at the RAC. She qualified as a solicitor in 2005 at Wragge & Co (now Gowling WLG), specialising in Commercial, Projects and Technology before joining RAC’s legal team in 2012. Clare went on to hold roles as Head of Legal, Data Protection, Company Secretary and Director of Risk and Compliance, as well as secondments to commercial positions within the Insurance and Telematics division, before becoming a member of RAC’s executive committee in 2023. She now leads the Governance, Risk and Compliance division and is the executive sponsor for Customer Experience across the Group.
Simon Edwards, Commercial Partner, Trowers & Hamlins
Simon is a Partner in Trowers & Hamlins Commercial team, with over 20 years’ experience advising on and negotiating commercial contracts for household name clients. Simon works closely with in-house legal teams and has spent time on secondment at 3 global consumer businesses. Simon is passionate about helping to develop individuals and high-performing teams, and has experience leading cross-functional teams, such as sector groups and currently the Trowers GC Steering Committee.
Kelly Young, Head of Legal and Company Secretary, MOO
Kelly is an experienced General Counsel & Company Secretary, with specific expertise in complex governance structures, leadership and transformation in highly regulated sectors. Kelly also holds two NED roles and is listed in the Lawyer Hot 100 2025.
Lesley Wan, Founder & CEO, The Eagle Club
Craig Duff, GC, Keyloop
Since 2021, Craig has served as General Counsel and Data Protection Officer for Keyloop, a global provider of technology solutions to the automotive industry. He leads the global Legal & Compliance team, overseeing a wide range of initiatives, including legal matters, risk management, insurance, ESG, and business continuity.
Victoria Robertson, Commercial Partner, Trowers & Hamlins
Victoria is a commercial and data law specialist and partner in Trowers and Hamlin’s commercial team.She focusses upon complex contracts and projects and in particular those involving data privacy issues. She has particular expertise in a wide range of technology agreements, regularly advising both providers and customers of IT services.
Victoria advises clients within various sectors including technology, life sciences, healthcare, financial services, manufacturing, education, charities and the public sector.
She is vastly experienced in dealing with tricky contractual issues especially where personal data is involved and regularly advises clients in the private and public sectors upon data matters including regulatory compliance, international transfers, and innovative usage of personal data.
Victoria has a particular interest in the life sciences, healthcare and fertility sectors, advising pharmaceutical companies, service providers in the pharma sector, fertility clinics and other service providers within the fertility sector. She is chair of the regulatory committee for the AI Fertility Society and regularly speaks on matters such as AI, ethics and data privacy.
Mark Maurice-Jones, General Counsel & Compliance Officer, Nestle
Mark Maurice‑Jones is General Counsel and Head of Legal for Nestlé UK & Ireland, leading a team of legal professionals who help shape the company’s agenda through proactive business partnering and a strong culture of integrity. As the most senior legal voice in the organisation, Mark advises the C‑suite on strategy, risk and governance.
Prior to Nestlé, Mark held senior legal roles at Kimberly‑Clark in the EMEA region, having begun his career as a competition lawyer in London and Brussels. He also serves on the Board of the Association of Corporate Counsel Europe (ACCE), where he co‑leads ACCE’s ESG programme.
Ben Stansfield, Planning & Environment Partner, Gowling WLG
Ben Stansfield is an environmental lawyer and joined international law firm Gowling WLG in 2019. He advises organisations across a range of industries on climate and sustainability issues, with a focus on adapting to the climate crisis, meeting decarbonisation targets and improving the natural environments where they operate. Mr Stansfield helps his clients “green” their property estate, incorporate sustainability measures into their supply chain, and meet their climate disclosure and reporting obligations. He co-chairs Gowling WLG’s internal Environment Committee and has been a trustee of the UK Environmental Law Association for over ten years.
Sean Adams, Commercial Disputes Partner, Gowling WLG
Sean has a broad commercial practice, with significant experience in a variety of sectors, including automotive, aerospace, financial services and renewable energy.
Sean focuses on corporate and commercial disputes for a wide variety of clients. Those disputes routinely include breach of contract claims, tort and negligence claims, post-M&A / acquisition disputes, investor and shareholder disputes, and serious and complex fraud claims. He also has significant experience handling supply chain disputes and assisting clients in seeking or responding to applications for urgent injunctive relief. Sean has a growing interest and practice dealing with FinTech disputes, particularly related to cryptoassets and blockchain technology and AI.
Bernardine Adkins, Of Counsel, EU, Trade and Competition, Gowling WLG
Bernardine is a competition litigator advising on some of the most high-profile and complex cases in the Competition Appeal Tribunal, the High Court and the Court of Appeal. Qualified both in the UK and as a Brussels advocate, she has extensive expertise in competition, foreign investment and trade matters. Her practice spans complex cross‑border regulatory, trade and policy issues, and she frequently contributes strategic insight on geopolitics, tariffs, sanctions and emerging international trade frameworks.
Nicki is Group General Counsel at Reach Plc, the largest newspaper publishing group in the United Kingdom, including household names such as The Mirror, The Express and OK magazine. The group also has publications in the Republic of Ireland and the US. Nicki manages a team of employed legal and data protection specialists, supported by freelance prepublication lawyers providing out of hours editorial legal cover to our publications.
With more than 20 years in the legal media sector, she began her career in private practice where she had a thriving defamation and copyright defendant practice, before moving in-house. She has since worked in-house in both the broadcast and print sectors.
Lesley Wan, Founder & CEO, The Eagle Club
Lesley is the Chair of the British Legal Awards Judging Panel and a highly experienced general counsel.
Lesley has been a voracious champion of D&I throughout her career, and supported all strands of diversity by fostering a positive culture where people’s different backgrounds, views and values are given appropriate respect at work.
She created the hugely successful Breakthrough Mentoring programme at Lloyds Banking Group to promote and retain female talent and built the membership to in excess of 15,500 employees across the organisation – the success of which she then used to raise the profile of other diversity initiatives at the bank.
Lesley is on the board of EurOut at London Business School and is a keen supporter of LGBT+ issues. She is the Founder and CEO of Through the Looking Glass Charity (which provides less affluent students with rare insight into City professions) and Founder and CEO of The Eagle Club – a global network of senior business professionals and general counsel (which helps support women in leadership positions to reach their potential and build strong support structures).
Laura Field, SSQ
Laura leads the UK In-House team of SSQ, a global legal search and recruitment consultancy. SSQ works with law firms and companies within commerce and industry and financial services, from scale ups to FTSE and Fortune listed companies, to build their legal, corporate governance and company secretarial teams from General Counsel level down. Laura and her wider team advise senior lawyers on their career strategy and provide clients with market intelligence on all matters involving recruitment, retention and salary benchmarking.
Sarah is a partner in our Competition team and is ranked in both Legal 500 and Chambers for her expertise in navigating complex UK and international regulatory regimes. She advises clients across the retail, consumer goods, financial services and energy sectors, where compliance pressures are, significant and constantly evolving. With extensive in-house experience gained through secondments at De Beers, Unilever, Tesco and Royal Mail, Sarah brings a practical understanding of how regulatory risks play out within a business. Sarah regularly helps organisations identify their UK compliance risks, anticipate upcoming regulatory developments and implement governance frameworks that reduce the likelihood of issues arising.
Sarah is known for providing user-friendly, commercial advice across all areas of competition law and foreign direct investment rules. She is particularly skilled at translating complex legal and economic concepts into clear, actionable guidance that supports business and GC decision-making.
Daniel Quy, General Counsel and Director of Compliance & Ethics, Royal Mail
Dan is responsible for leading the Legal & Compliance team – which includes Commercial & Technology, Competition, Compliance, Crime, Employment, Litigation, IP and Property sub-teams. Dan is a qualified solicitor with 20 years’ experience, focusing on postal services, logistics and supply chain, telecoms and TV. He has been at Royal Mail Group for almost 10 years, prior to this Dan worked in the Competition & Regulation team at Sky UK.