Our Senior Team

Tom Aldred, Executive Director

Tom joined UKGI in May 2018 and is leading the team managing the government’s shareholding in the Post Office. Tom previously led the Growth Economics team at HM Treasury. His work included detailed analysis of the UK’s growth performance and the priorities for economic reform. He led the development of the framework for long run growth in the government’s Productivity Plan of July 2015. He previously worked at DCLG and Cabinet Office, with a particular focus on housing and urban policy. Tom has been a member of the Government Economic Service since 2003.

Emily Ashwell, Executive Director

Emily joined UKGI (formerly ShEx) in June 2015. She has led the shareholder teams on Channel 4, UK Export Finance, the Nuclear Liabilities Fund and currently sits on the board of Ordnance Survey. Emily joined the Civil Service in August 2013 to launch and lead UKTI Education, a unit jointly established by the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills and UK Trade & Investment to help the UK education sector win business overseas, particularly in relation to high value opportunities. The unit helped UK education and training providers secure £1.5 billion of business in its first two years. Prior to this, Emily spent 13 years in corporate finance, most recently as a Director with Hawkpoint Partners (now Canaccord Genuity) focused on Media & Education. She has a broad range of M&A transaction and corporate advisory experience working for a range of UK and international private, public and charitable companies. Emily holds a PPE degree from Oriel College, Oxford.

Carolyn Battersby, Executive Director

Since joining UKGI (formerly ShEx) in July 2011, Carolyn has worked on NATS, the sale of Eurostar and Network Rail asset sales.  Previously Carolyn was at Tesco focussed on corporate finance and strategy.  Prior to this she worked at The Prince’s Trust on the programme supporting young people starting up in business.  Carolyn began her career in finance at Schroders and then Permira.

Richard Callard, Executive Director

Richard currently works within UKGI’s new joint unit with the Ministry of Defence, which provides corporate finance and governance advice on a range of issues facing the MOD.  Until recently, Richard led the Post Office Shareholder team and was a NED on the Post Office Board for four years. Previously, Richard also led UKGI’s team overseeing Government’s shareholding in the Green Investment Bank, and led the establishment of one of the UK’s largest employee shares schemes during the privatisation of Royal Mail.

Richard joined UKGI from Deloitte, where he advised on public-private finance deals.  He is a Chartered Accountant by background.

Jamie Carter, Executive Director

Jamie has worked as an Executive Director for UK Government Investments since October 2016, where he leads the teams managing the government’s shareholding in the British Business Bank and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.  He has also sat on the board of The Royal Mint since September 2017.

Prior to joining UKGI he spent more than 10 years at HM Treasury where he specialised in public spending, including being involved in several spending reviews and leading the HMT oversight of major transport investments. During this period, Jamie took a 2 year career break to work as a Governance Specialist at the World Bank based in Jakarta.

Robin Cartwight, Executive Director

Robin joined UKGI in September 2018, where he is leading projects in the UKGI joint unit with the Ministry of Defence (MOD).  Robin joined from KPMG where we was a Partner in the Global Strategy Group working on a broad range of deal strategy, operating model and market intelligence projects for the public and private sectors.  He ran KPMG’s M&A European business for aerospace, industrial markets and business services, and established the European deal strategy capability in Amsterdam and London,.  He worked on ‘pathfinder’ PFI deals in MOD, and was lead partner for Department for Education. Robin was most recently a Director of Social Finance LLP where he lead a programme dedicated to improving outcomes for young people leaving the UK care system. He began his career in MOD as a Principal combatting security threats to UK.

Tom Cooper, Director

Tom Cooper joined UK Government Investments in October 2017.

Tom was most recently Global Co-Chairman of M&A at Deutsche Bank where he worked from 2009 – 2017. He started his career at KMPG and was at UBS Investment Bank for 21 years where his various roles included Head of European M&A.

Charles Donald, Director

Charles joined UK Government Investments in May 2018 as Head of the Financial Institutions Group.

Prior to that, he spent over 30 years in investment banks working in both investment banking and equity research. He joined UKGI from Credit Suisse where he was Vice Chairman of UK Advisory & Corporate Broking having previously been Co-Head of UK Investment Banking. His prior senior roles included Head of Equity Research and then Head of Corporate Broking at Lehman Brothers and Head of UK Investment Banking at Nomura.

Hannah Gray, Executive Director

Hannah joined UKGI Special Situations in 2017.  The special Situations team are sector and restructuring/insolvency experts who focus on sectors and corporates where there is the risk of economic shock impact to major employment or assets of national interest.  Hannah has provided debt and balance sheet advice to stressed and distressed corporates since 2001. She is a highly experienced advisor, having worked on a wide range of projects covering strategic balance sheet reviews, recapitalisations, debt-for-equity swaps, creditor representation, covenant renegotiations, securitisation advisory, high yield bond issuance, rights offerings, private debt placements and stressed M&A.  Hannah is a FCA and has previously worked for Deloitte, UBS, Rothschild and PwC.

Michael Harrison, Director

Michael Harrison joined UK Government Investments in March 2009 and has worked on a range of projects across government including  interventions into the UK Motor Sector and the sale of UK student loans . Michael has also undertaken a number of NED roles. He was on the Board of the company managing and realising Royal Mail pension fund assets. He currently is an observer on the board of Network Rail, a Non Executive Director of Porton Biopharma and sits on the investment committee of the Charity for Civil Servants.

He has a broad international corporate advisory background having spent his previous eight years before joining government as an executive director in Australia working for independent corporate finance advisor Greenhill Caliburn.

Prior to that Michael spent 12 years in investment banking with CSFB and BZW in both London and Europe. He started his career as an accountant at PWC.

David Long, Executive Director

David Long joined UKGI in September 2013 where he has worked on a range of transactions and assets including Electricity Market Reform, Hinkley Point C and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. He is also a non-executive director of the Low Carbon Contracts Company and the Electricity Settlements Company. His professional experience covers a range of commercial and financial roles in the energy sector, most recently at UBS Global Asset Management (2004-12) where he was responsible for investment in European utility, infrastructure and chemical companies. Prior to this, he was a project director at AES Corporation (1999-2004) developing greenfield power projects in Europe, leading on contract negotiations and project financing. David started his career in finance at NM Rothschild (1993-1999), providing corporate finance advice in the natural resources and utilities sectors.

Martin Madsen, Executive Director

Martin joined UKGI in February 2018 and his current focus is the shareholdings of HM Treasury in RBS and UK Asset Resolution (UKAR). Prior to joining UKGI, Martin spent more than 10 years in investment banking, predominantly within the UBS Financial Institutions Group and more recently at specialist M&A advisory firm Quayle Munro where he focused on advising specialty finance and Fintech firms.

His corporate finance experience includes a broad range of M&A transactions, equity raisings and corporate advisory roles across sub-sectors such as banking, insurance and specialty finance. Prior to joining UBS’s FIG team, Martin worked for two years on the fixed income sales and trading floor.

Justin Manson, Deputy Chief Executive   

Justin joined UK Government Investments as a director at its creation on 1 April 2016. Before that, he was a director in the Shareholder Executive which he joined in June 2015. Previously he was an investment banker at Morgan Stanley for 20 years and before that at CSFB and First Boston for 8 years. He has corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, and capital markets experience across numerous industries and was based in London, New York, Tokyo and Mexico City. He has been an adviser to governments and state-owned companies. He is a former trustee of the Royal National Theatre Foundation and the Chelsea Academy Foundation.

Tim Martin, Executive Director

Tim joined UKGI (formerly ShEx) in 2005  following a long career in investment banking and five years at the Office of Rail Regulation as Director of Economics and Finance. Tim began his career as a corporate lawyer with Allen&Overy where he worked on a variety of corporate transactions, including public sector investment and financing. As an investment banker, Tim advised either Government and industry on many of the main utility privatisations, as well as a number of M&A transactions.

In ShEx, Tim initially advised on setting up the governance arrangements for the publicly-owned water companies in Scotland and Northern Ireland and a number of commercial transactions, including major land sales for the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. Until recently he sat on the Board of the Royal Mint and sits as on several project boards across Government. He is currently advising on some major financial issues for Government relating to the oil and gas and steel industries and is a member of the UKGI specialist corporate governance group.

Tim McInnes, Executive Director

Tim joined UKGI in 2012 and was appointed co-lead of the Student Loans sale programme in July 2019. Since joining Tim has also worked with the Post Office, helping to secure the network more than £1 billion government funding and leading State aid negotiations with the European Commission, as well as providing support to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on a range of projects including Channel 4, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Tim also leads UKGI’s efforts on diversity and inclusion.
Before joining UKGI Tim worked for Lazard and ABN AMRO in London, Vienna and New York with a primary focus on the industrials sector. Tim is a trustee of the Herne Hill Velodrome Trust.

Madelaine McTernan, Executive Director

Maddy joined UKGI in 2017.  Prior to that, she was a Managing Director and Head of UK M&A at Credit Suisse. Maddy worked on a broad range of strategic advisory mandates through her investment banking career with a focus on cross-border M&A.  Prior to her 10 years at Credit Suisse, she worked in Lehman Brothers’ UK Investment Banking team and before that was a corporate lawyer at Freshfields.  Maddy was an Honorary Senior Visiting Fellow in the Faculty of Finance at Cass Business School between 2013 and 2016.  She holds a law degree from Trinity College, Cambridge.

Candida Morley, Director

Candida joined UK Government Investment in October 2017.
Candida was previously at HgCapital where she was an Operating Partner. Between 2001 – 2015 she worked at private equity fund LDC (where her roles included Chief Portfolio Offer and Chief Operating Officer), prior to which she worked at Elementis plc, 3i plc and as Director of Development at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Daniel Okubo, Executive Director

Daniel joined UKGI in 2018 to head up the policy function in the Financial Institutions Group. Before joining UKGI, Daniel was a Deputy Director in HM Treasury’s Financial Stability Group where he led various projects and teams. Daniel has also previously worked at the Bank of England leading some of the post crisis reform agenda.

Anna Payton, Executive Director

Anna Payton joined UKGI (formerly ShEx) in October 2012. Anna began her career as a project finance lawyer at Allen & Overy, specializing in PFI and energy infrastructure transactions. Her professional experience following this included commercial and financial project finance roles in the energy sector, both as a fund manager for an energy and infrastructure fund in Zurich, and prior to that as a commercial manager in the corporate venturing arm of the Carbon Trust.  Whilst at UKGI, Anna’s has worked in particular with the former department DECC on delivery structures for renewable energy incentives, and latterly has been leading UKGI’s housing work with MHCLG as well as advising DfT on alternative rail network delivery.  Anna also leads on aspects of UKGI’s internal corporate governance practice

Robert Razzell, Chief Financial Officer

Robert Razzell joined UKGI in September 2016. Prior to this, he was head of finance at the London Legacy Development Corporation, the body responsible for the Olympic Park and its legacy, having previously been head of finance at the Olympic Delivery Authority, the entity responsible for delivery of the venues and infrastructure for the London 2012 Olympics.

Before this Robert had spells working in central and local Government, having completed qualifications at PwC.

Alex Reeves, Executive Director

Alex joined UK Government Investments (formerly the Shareholder Executive) in January 2010, and has worked on a variety of corporate finance projects, including real estate and investment portfolio sales, and government investments in the aerospace and steel sectors. He currently leads on inward M&A, Royal Mail pension assets and other corporate finance projects. He is a Non Executive Director of London & Continental Railways Limited and runs UKGI’s NED Forum.

Prior to joining UKGI, Alex spent over ten years in corporate advisory and investment banking roles focused on the financial services sector, most recently in the FIG Merger and Acquisitions (M&A) Team at Jefferies in London. During this time, he advised on and managed a large number of UK and cross-border M&A transactions for UK, European and US clients, with a particular focus on the asset management sector.

Mark Russell, Chief Executive

Mark Russell was appointed Chief Executive of the Shareholder Executive (now UK Government Investments) in April 2013. Mark joined the Shareholder Executive as head of its Corporate Finance Practice in November 2004 and was appointed Deputy Chief Executive in April 2008.

Previously Mark was a partner in the corporate finance departments of KPMG London and KPMG Frankfurt. Prior to this Mark worked at PwC Corporate Finance and Robert Fleming & Co., Lazard Brothers and A.T. Kearney.

Ceri Smith, Director

Ceri joined the Shareholder Executive as a Director in June 2013 to lead on the creation of the British Business Bank, and has continued to act as the Shareholder Representative Director through the transition to UKGI. He also looks after a number of other portfolio assets, including Ordnance Survey, HM Land Registry, the Royal Mint and latterly, Homes England.

Ceri started his career in HM Treasury where he worked in a range of areas including financial services and tax policy for over ten years. Immediately prior to joining the Shareholder Executive, Ceri was Labour Market Director in the Business Department, responsible for the UK’s employment law framework.

Susie Timlin, Chief Operating Officer

Susie joined in January 2019 as the Chief Operating Officer. Her role is to ensure that UKGI has effective management, optimal organisational design and the best talent to enable the delivery of an exceptional service. Prior to joining UKGI, Susie worked as Global Director of People and Culture at Hays Talent Solutions, where her role was to build and develop complex international teams, based on-site with clients and at global centres of excellence on every continent. Other roles with Hays included EMEA Sales Director and Head of African Recruitment. Prior to Hays, Susie worked for the Lloyds banking group.

Holger Vieten, Director

Holger joined UKGI in May 2018 as Head of Banking & Capital Markets of UKGI’s Financial Institutions Group. He has spent over 20 years advising UK and European financial institutions on a broad range of mergers and acquisitions, capital markets and restructuring transactions. Before joining UKGI Holger was an investment banker at Moelis & Company for 8 years and previously at Morgan Stanley for 7 years having started his career at Credit Suisse.

Richard Watson, General Counsel

Richard Joined UKGI as General Counsel in July 2018. Richard was a commercial litigator before joining the then Department of Trade and Industry in 2000 initially advising its Companies Investigation Branch. He first worked with UKGI’s predecessor, the Shareholder Executive, on the privatisation of the Royal Mail and the establishment of the Green Investment Bank.

For the last 5 years he has been a Deputy Director in the Government Legal Department leading a team advising the Ministry of Housing on housing policy and supply.

Ed Westhead, Executive Director

Ed joined UKGI in June 2015 as an Executive Director and led preparations for the first ICR student loan sale for two years. His current focus is on projects with the Department of Health & Social Care as well as advising BEIS on the aerospace sector. He is currently a non-executive board member of HM Land Registry and previously was a non-executive board member of Companies House. Prior to joining ShEx, Ed spent thirteen years in corporate finance with Macquarie in Sydney and London, advising on M&A, capital raising and private equity investment, primarily in the financial institutions sector. Before Macquarie, Ed worked for BAE Systems, initially as an engineer with BAE Airbus and then in corporate development / M&A roles at the corporate head office and for BAE’s Australian operations.