Policy Fellowships Showcase: Engineering better public services

Sir Chris Wormald KCB

Sir Chris was appointed Permanent Secretary at Department of Health (now Department of Health and Social Care) in May 2016. Prior to joining Department of Health and Social Care, Chris was Permanent Secretary at the Department for Education. Sir Chris joined the Civil Service in 1991 as a fast streamer at the (then) Department of Education and Science. He worked in a range of posts on education policy, including spells as Principal Private Secretary to Estelle Morris and then Charles Clarke and as Director of Academies and Schools Capital. He then took on the role of Director General for Local Government and Regeneration at the Department for Communities and Local Government (now Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government). His other roles in Cabinet Office include Director General of Public Service Reform; Head of the Economic and Domestic Secretariat and Director General in the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office.

Abbie Badcock-Broe

Abbie is the Head of Corporate, UK and Decarbonisation Strategy at National Grid since August 2024. She is responsible for the Board and Exec engagement on National Grid’s strategy, working closely with UK business units and regulation teams on cross cutting themes, challenges and programmes. Prior to her current role, she was the Head of Corporate Strategy at National Grid ESO since March 2023 responsible for company strategy, strategy process and strategic initiatives. She joined National Grid as a Principal Consultant in internal consultancy team in 2020. Abbie has worked in the energy sector since 2007 for companies including npower, Economy Energy, Ocean Energy Europe, IT Power and FC Business Intelligence/Reuters. She held roles in strategy, consulting, corporate development, project management, business development, policy and market analysis. Abbie is passionate about creating a sustainable future for all; driven by addressing complex problems and developing strategies that create meaningful change.

Jo Reilly

Jo is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Centre for the Future of Intelligence at Cambridge and has recently completed a Churchill Fellowship in New Zealand, looking at support services for those affected by sexual violence. She was previously a Policy Fellow at the Royal Academy of Engineering, looking at how to apply systems thinking to tackling child criminal exploitation, and a Policy Fellow at Cambridge's Centre for Science and Policy looking at Serious and Organised Crime. Her previous roles include Head of the Serious Organised Crime Unit in His Majesty's Prison and Probation Service, Senior Adviser in the Prime Minister’s Implementation Unit, and Public Affairs Adviser to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Alex van Someren FREng

Alex van Someren was appointed Chief Scientific Adviser for National Security in July 2021. Alex was previously a venture capital investor and entrepreneur, focusing on investing in early stage ‘deep technology’ startups. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, an Honorary Professor of Computer Science at the University of Manchester, and a current member of the Royal Society’s Science, Industry and Translation Committee. During 2019 he was the Visiting Clore Innovation Professor at the Royal College of Art. Alex participated in the development of the BBC Microcomputer & Acorn Electron at Acorn Computer in the 1980s. He subsequently co-founded several technology companies, including ANT Software plc and nCipher plc which achieved listings on AIM and the London Stock Exchange, respectively. Alex’s scientific work is in the broad area of software engineering and computer science.

Nick Starkey

Nick is Director of Policy and International at the Royal Academy of Engineering. He directs the Academy’s leadership of the National Engineering Policy Centre which brings engineering thinking to the heart of policymaking, creating positive impacts for society, on issues ranging from skills provision, Net Zero, research and innovation, health and resilience, and digital and physical infrastructures. Nick also leads the Academy’s International teams, which includes bilateral partnerships with Academies and other institutions across the globe and Engineering X, an international collaboration that brings together some of the world’s leading problem-solvers to address the great challenges of our age. It also includes the Academy’s Africa programmes, which work across the continent of Africa to advance engineering’s contribution to a safer, healthier, more prosperous world, tackling the global challenges of our time, and our Global Talent Visas scheme, supporting the UK immigration route for talented and promising individuals in specific sectors wishing to work in the UK. Nick joined the Academy in January 2018 from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Skills, and has previously worked for the Cabinet Office, Defra, the National Farmers’ Union, and the British Red Cross.

Sripriya Sudhakar

Sripriya is an architect, urban designer and urban planning professional with over 24 years' experience in the built environment ranging from public realm projects, regeneration, town centre development frameworks and master plans both in private and public sector. She is the Director of Planning and Building control at the London Borough of Tower Hamlets responsible for the planning service in one of the fastest growing places in the country. She has an undergraduate degree in Architecture and Post Graduate Diploma in Urban Design from India , MSc in City Design and Social Science from LSE and MA in Urban and Regional Planning from Westminster University.

Dr David Cleevely CBE FREng FIET

David Cleevely is an entrepreneur who has founded a series of companies including Abcam, Analysys and the award-winning restaurant Bocca di Lupo. He is Chairman of Chemify (a Glasgow University spin out founded with Professor Lee Cronin), Focal Point Positioning, and the Cambridge Science Centre. He was Chairman of the Raspberry Pi Foundation, Founding Director of the Centre for Science and Policy, University of Cambridge and co-founded Cambridge Network, Cambridge Wireless, Cambridge Angels and Cambridge Ahead. He was Vice-Chair of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Review, Chair of the Cambridge Autonomous Metro (CAM) Technical Advisory Committee and Chair of the enquiry into policy after Covid, the ‘New Era for the Cambridge Economy’. He also chairs the Royal Academy of Engineering Policy Fellowships Working Group. For 8 years until March 2009 he was a member of the Ofcom Spectrum Advisory Board and from 2001 to 2008 he was a member of the Ministry of Defence DES-ISS (DCSA) Board. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in Education by Bath University in 2022 and an honorary doctorate in Technology by Anglia Ruskin University in July 2023.