Sir Harvey McGrath (Chair)
Harvey has had a long and distinguished career in the international financial services industry and is the former chair of Prudential plc, the London Development Agency, London First and Man Group plc. His current roles include co-chair of the Mayor of London’s Enterprise Panel, Chair of Governors of Birkbeck College and Chair of Big Society Capital.
Dr Cathy Garner, Executive Director, The Work Foundation
Cathy is the Executive Director of The Work Foundation, which is a leading provider of research-based analysis, knowledge exchange and policy advice on work, skills and the labour market in the UK and beyond. She is an expert in innovation and has both researched and led programmes to stimulate innovation, – most notably as the Strategic Director of London Creative and Digital Fusion and Chief Executive of Manchester: Knowledge Capital. With over 25 years of delivering in practice, she specialises in developing and delivering solutions that work for cities, local communities, business and individuals. Her approach embraces leveraging commercial drivers for social good and building successful university-business partnerships.. Cathy was a founder director of the Scottish North American Business Council and inaugural Vice President International for the Association of University Technology Managers of the USA. Previously she served on the Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property between 2008 and 2010, was a member of the UK Cabinet Office Innovators’ Council in 2009 and led an international charity to address the health needs of the global poor through creative intellectual property solutions. She is a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society; a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Member of the Merchant Company of Edinburgh.
Alexandra Jones, Chief Executive, Centre for Cities
Alexandra has led the Centre for Cities since 2010. She has played a leading role in shaping the increasingly high profile cities agenda and is regularly called upon to advise senior policymakers in national and local government. As well as leading strategic projects around the country, she is also called on to facilitate meetings in order to help partners agree how best to work together. She has worked with organisations ranging from Leeds City Region and the Solent Local Enterprise Partnership to the business-led West End Partnership. Alexandra has been a member of the City Finance Commission, the London Finance Commission and the London Stansted Cambridge Corridor Commission, as well as an advisor to the City Growth Commission led by Jim O’Neill. An experienced presenter and commentator for broadcast and print media, Alexandra writes on a wide range of issues affecting cities around the world. Previously she led the ‘Ideopolis’ Knowledge Cities team at the Work Foundation and worked as Private Secretary to the Permanent Secretary in the Department for Education and Skills.
Gerard Lyons, Economist
Gerard Lyons is acting as a Growth Commissioner in a private capacity. He is the former Chief Economist and Group Head of Global Research at Standard Chartered Bank. He now advises Mayor of London Boris Johnson on economic issues both local, national and international. Previous to his appointment at Standard Chartered, Gerard served as Chief Economist and Executive Director at DKB International, as Chief UK economist at the Swiss Bank Corporation and Chief Economist at UK stockbroker Savory Milln. Gerard regularly appears in the media, often writing in the Telegraph and The Times. He has testified before the House of Lords Select Committee on the Bank of England and was a member of the Commission that examined the economic consequences if Britain retained the pound.
Professor Ron Martin, The University of Cambridge
Professor Ron Martin is Professor of Economic Geography at the University of Cambridge. His main research interests include the geographies of labour markets; regional development and competitiveness; the geographies of money and finance; geographical economics; and evolutionary economic geography. He has published some 35 books and monographs, and 200 articles, on these and related themes. He is an editor on the Cambridge Journal of Economics; Journal of Economic Geography; Geographie, Economie, Society; International Regional Science Review; the Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, and Economic Geography. He also co-edits the book series Regions and Cities, for the Regional Studies Association. He compiled the five-volume reference set on Economic Geography for Routledge in 2007, and (with Ron Boschma) the highly successful Handbook of Evolutionary Economic Geography in 2010. He has been involved in a number of major policy-orientated research projects for the UK government as well as the European Commission. At the Department of Geography, he teaches a second year paper on Economic Geography and a third year paper on the Geographies of the British Economy. He supervises several PhD students. He is an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences, a Fellow of the British Academy, and Honorary Fellow of the Regional Studies Association.
Ian Mather, Chair, Cambridge Ahead
Ian Mather is the Chairman of Cambridge Ahead which was formed in 2013. It is a business and academic member organisation. Members include ARM, AstraZeneca, Marshall Group, Cambridge University and Addenbrookes hospital. There are 37 member organisations as well as notable individuals. Members account for 30,000 jobs local to Cambridge. The organisation was formed to provide a business focus for the long term development of Cambridge. Project groups include those focussing on economic growth, housing and transport. Cambridge Ahead have worked with a number of key organisations, including councils, to produce The Case for Cambridge – a request to the Government to find ways to improve infrastructure investment in the Cambridge region.
Ian is a Partner and heads the office of national law firm Mills & Reeve which has 300 staff based in Cambridge. He has lived and worked in Cambridge for over 30 years. He specialises in employment law and advises employers from early stage tech companies to some of the largest organisations in the country. He is an accredited mediator. Ian is also Chairman of Cambridge Arts Theatre.
Expert advisors to the Growth Commission
Juliette Morgan, Partner, Cushman & Wakefield
Juliette is Head of Property at Tech City and a Partner within Cushman & Wakefield’s London Markets team. She is an urban tech specialist with more than 12 years international experience in developing and managing property for tech and bio tech companies. Juliette has worked on millions of square feet under development and management in tech centres in the US and UK and advises investors, developers, occupiers and government on property strategy. As Head of Property at Tech City UK, Juliette is responsible for advising the UK Government on its property strategy and policy initiatives to accelerate growth in tech start ups in East London.
Professor Michael Enright, The University of Hong Kong and Enright, Scott & Associates
Professor Enright’s research has focused on international competitiveness, regional clustering of industry, and economic development. He has directed or co-directed major reviews of economies in 20 countries on five continents and has co-authored ten books on competitiveness and numerous papers on regional clustering.
Professor Pete Tyler, The University of Cambridge
Professor Peter Tyler is an urban and regional economist with an extensive track record in consulting for the public and private sector. He has an established reputation in the field of urban and regional economics with a particular emphasis on the evaluation of policy. This is illustrated by him having been a Project Director for over sixty major research projects for Government and which has resulted in the publication of forty research monographs of which twenty-four have been of book length. He has published in all the major academic journals in the field. Besides his work in the United Kingdom he has also undertaken research for the European Commission and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on urban, regional and industrial policy.
Executive support to the Growth Commission
Glenn Athey, Programme Manager for the LSCC Growth Commission
Glenn is responsible for helping the Growth Commissioners develop and implement the work programme and inquiry events. He is the day-to-day contact for all issues concerning the Growth Commission. Glenn is an independent consultant and advisor to many localities and cities within the UK on economic development issues such as enterprise, skills, regeneration and local economic strategies. As a professional economist, Glenn has published numerous reports on local, regional and national economic issues. Glenn has a thorough knowledge of the London-Stansted-Cambridge Corridor – through his consultancy work, role as Interim Executive Director of Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough LEP, Director of Research and Intelligence at the East of England Development Agency, Head of Enterprise Policy at London Development Agency, and Head of Research at the Centre for Cities.
