Conference Speakers
Event Speakers:
Bill Esterson, MP, Shadow Minister (Business and Industrial Strategy)
Bill Esterson has been MP for Sefton Central since 2010 and is Shadow Minister for Business and Industry. His brief covers manufacturing, construction and professional services and includes responsibilities for skills, levelling up and net zero. Mr Esterson started and grew two businesses between 1995 and 2010 and was a local councillor before entering parliament. He graduated from Leeds University in 1990 with BSc Hons in Maths and Philosophy and trained as a chartered accountant after graduating. He was a member of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Education, Housing, Communities & Local Government and Treasury Committees between 2010 and 2015, is Treasurer of the Tribune group of Labour MPs, chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, vice-chair of the All Party Group for Children in Care and Care Leavers and vice chair of the All Party Group on Carbon Capture and Underground Storage.
Jackie Hewson, Alternative Fuels Implementation Manager, John Lewis Partnership
John Lewis Partnership’s headline commitments include running all heavy duty trucks on biomethane by 2028, and achieving a zero carbon fleet by 2035, together with an ambition to remove all fossil fuel from the fleet by 2030.
Jackie, working in the fleet team, has over 10 years experience of managing large projects and leads the implementation of the fleet alternatives fuels strategy. One recent success was negotiating the installation of hundreds of customer charging points for EVs. Her work now continues with initial trials of EVs and charging infrastructure for the commercial fleet and will result in full-scale roll-out in 2 to 5 years' time. Overall the plan involves the implementation of smart charging at over 250 fleet sites, 4,500 alternatively fuelled vehicles, setting up long term fuel supply contracts and coordinating a large number of stakeholders to deliver the fleet decarbonising plan.
Richard Riley, Senior Principal Consultant, Element Energy, an ERM Company
Element Energy is a net zero consultancy based in the UK with 20 years of experience working solely on economy wide decarbonisation. Richard has been at Element Energy since 2016 and now leads the businesses commercial vehicle decarbonisation offering. He has led the delivery of strategic analysis of commercial vehicle decarbonisation for a wide range of major clients including CCC, DfT, OEMs, fleet operators and O&G majors. From this work he has developed leading expertise in zero emission vehicles, low carbon fuels, future infrastructure development and fleet decarbonisation analysis.
Denise Beedell, Senior Policy Manager, Logistics UK
Denise helps to deliver Logistic UK’s urban and environmental logistics policy agenda, in particular, proactively leading Logistics UK’s policy work on vans, including publications, information services and discussion forums in connection with policy and regulatory issues. Denise joined Logistics UK in August 2018 from the Federation of Small Businesses, where she was Development Manager for Greater London and led on Transport, Environment and Crime policy issues in the capital.
Andy Hill, Commercial Vehicle Manager, Lex Autolease
Andy has 37 years of experience in the commercial vehicle arena, with the last 23 years in the leasing industry.
Adopting a consultative approach Andy likes to get under the skin of his customers and their businesses, understanding their challenges, needs and aspirations connected to the commercial vehicle fleet. This approach and attention to detail has helped bring innovation, efficiencies and improvements to fleets across many different industry sectors such retail, construction, facilities management, rail, passenger transport and emergency services to name just a few.
Always with an eye on health & safety, new developments, technologies and legislation Andy will ensure that any solutions he delivers are modern, safe, legally compliant, fit for purpose and as far as possible future proof to all known upcoming legislation.
Well know and highly respected in the LCV industry, Andy sits on the influential BVRLA Commercial Vehicle Committee and plays an active role in the Logistics UK Van Excellence Scheme.
Matt Doherty, Connections Engineer, National Grid
Matt Doherty's day job is as a Connections Engineer specialising in renewable energy connection at National Grid. However, he also wrote a hydrogen strategy for the organisation's commercial fleet during his graduate placement. Matt's passion for sustainable transportation has stemmed from there, leading him to participate in two GB EV rallies. In 2022, he drove an EV car from John O'Groats to Lands' End, and in 2023, he embarked on a five-day journey through Cardiff, London, Edinburgh, Belfast, and Dublin in an EV van. With a deep understanding of the UK energy system, Matt is dedicated to paving the way towards a renewable future.
Graham Gardner, Corporate Sales Manager, Webfleet UKI
For more than two decades, Graham has been an integral part of the automotive industry. He has worked with some of the biggest fleet services providers in the UK, and over the past ten years, he has dedicated his efforts to delivering top technology solutions. Graham's focus lies in providing optimised solutions, including Vehicle and Video Telematics, that aim to enhance driver safety while reducing fleet costs. His approach is driven by data, enabling fleets to make informed decisions that lead to significant savings.
Paul Johnson, Business Development Manager, The AA
Paul Johnson brings more than 35 years’ experience in fleet management operations to the team and is responsible for delivering efficient, professional and quality customer-focused service. Following his previous roles at Royal Mail, Hitachi and National Grid, Paul is an integral part of the AA’s Business Services team supporting our Fleet customers. Paul works with key customers on all aspects of fleet management, utilising his vast experience of customer service, data, accident management and SMR.
Laura Lancaster, Vice President of EV Networks & Partnerships, Fleetcor
Laura has worked with business and EV payment solutions at Fleetcor and Shell for the last eight years. Laura and her team are working to build Europe's largest and fastest public charging network for Fleetcor's payment solution brands Allstar, Mina, Plugsurfing, Travelcard and CCS. Making it simpler for business fleets to pay for charging and manage their mixed fleets through the transition to EV.
Adrian Keen, CEO, InstaVolt
Adrian has a proven track record in growing agile businesses within the clean energy and technology sectors.
Adrian joined InstaVolt in April 2017 as CFO, and held the role of CEO since August 2019. Since that date he has overseen a period of rapid growth and transformation which now includes international expansion into Iceland, Ireland, Spain and Portugal.
In a previous role as CFO at one of the world’s top 100 cleantech companies, turnover grew from £21million to over £200million, making it for two years running the fastest growing private company in the UK.
Adrian has also been CFO at private-equity owned international consultancy business Alpha FMC Group, and Financial Controller at P2i Ltd, a rapidly growing company operating within the field of nano-technology.
His experiences also include finance roles in the logistics and education sectors, as well as time spent at KPMG. He lives with his young family in Oxfordshire.
Ashley Tate, CEO and Co-Founder, Mina
Ash's journey in the world of business started in 2003 when he was 15. Since then he's had some major failures, some great successes and through all his experiences he's learned a lot.
With over 10 years' experience in energy and utilities, Ash brought his expertise over to the world of EV and ever since 2020 has been dedicated to accelerating the transition to electric vehicles within businesses and fleets at Mina, by making paying for EV charging radically simple, bringing a unique perspective to the EV space.
Richard Coy, Assistant Traffic Manager, Civils Delivery Directorate, HS2 Ltd
After leaving the Armed Forces having served 10 years in the infantry, Richard entered the world of civil engineering initially as an engineer working on highway schemes.
Richard soon became involved in temporary traffic management (TM) and construction logistics which became his primary role and has spent time in the UK, Australia, the Middle East, and China delivering schemes of all sizes.
Richard has sat on a number of industry forums such as the Road Workers Safety Forum to develop innovative ways to improve safety for both the road worker and road user. This also involves developing and delivering training courses to the wider industry.
As a former semi-professional FMX rider, Richard also has close links to the event industry and has managed the TM and logistics for Red Bull at events including Red Bull X Fighters, Red Bull Air Race and other smaller motorsport events.
In his spare time Richard supports his son at events who is also an FMX rider and is an active member of The Royal British Legion.
Kevin Green, Marketing and Communications Director, Logistics UK
Kevin Green is the Marketing & Communications Director for Logistics UK – one of the biggest business groups in the UK: supporting, shaping and standing up for safe and efficient Logistics. Kevin has worked in Communications leadership roles for a number of large corporates including Capita, Logica, Mitie, Balfour Beatty, KPMG and PwC.
Project highlights include working on the sale and implementation for major Public Private Partnerships, including; Congestion Charging in London, The Criminal Records Bureau and HS2, delivering The Skills Show for 100,000 young people, and developing the Future Logistics conference at ITT!
