Our trustees
Our trustees

Phil Barton, Chair

Phil is the former chief executive of Keep Britain Tidy, the charity which campaigns for a cleaner, greener England, running environmental programmes including EcoSchools, Green Flag Awards for greenspaces and Blue Flag beaches. Formerly, he worked for the NWDA on regeneration skills, for Defra on rural voluntary sector policy and for Groundwork UK. He established the Mersey Basin Trust as part of the successful 25-year Mersey Basin Campaign to clean the waters of the Merseycatchment. He is also a practising artist studying for an MA at Central Saint Martins in Art and Science.

Sarah Deasley

Sarah is a Director at the consultancy Frontier Economics. She has over 25 years’ experience working as an economist within the energy sector with a focus on environmental policy, network regulation and the energy retail market. She is well known for her recent work on the implications of the move to a low-carbon economy, with a particular focus on smart technologies and consumer energy behaviour.

Joe Perkins

Joe Perkins is a Senior Vice President and Head of Research at the economic consultancy Compass Lexecon. Joe previously worked as Chief Economist at British energy regulator Ofgem, where he was a member of Ofgem’s senior leadership team. He led the delivery of Ofgem’s ground-breaking decarbonization action plan, as well as the analysis behind the setting of the retail energy price cap. Joe headed up Ofgem’s economics profession and was Ofgem’s senior representative on the UK Regulators Network.

Prior to this, Joe was director for regulation, consumers and competition at the National Audit Office, responsible for value for money audits of economic and financial regulation and the competition and consumer protection regimes. He began his professional career as an economist at HM Treasury.

Academically, Joe was a Prize Fellow in Economics at All Souls College in Oxford University between 2002 and 2009, and lectured economics at several colleges. He has a wide range of academic and professional publications. He is a member of the Council of Management of the Regulatory Policy Institute and is chair of the trustees of the journal Oxford Economic Papers.

Derek Lickorish MBE

Derek’s career has spanned some 48 years in the energy business. Until 2015, he was Chair of the Government’s Fuel Poverty Advisory Group. He is currently honorary  Chair of the Trustees of National Energy Action; Chair of Northern Powergrid's Social Issues Expert Group; an adviser to Secure Meters SHPL Pte; and a member of Ofgem’s Sustainable Development Advisory Group. Previously, he was EDF Energy’s Chief Operating Officer (Customers Branch) and the Customer Service and External Affairs Director at SWEB from 1996. He started his career as a trainee at Seeboard in 1970. He was awarded an MBE for his services to the Fuel Poor in the Queens Diamond Jubilee honours 2012.

Gordon Mackerron

Gordon was Director of the University of Sussex Science Policy Research Unit and is now Professor of Science and Technology Policy. Previously, he was Director of the Sussex Energy Group at SPRU, prior to which he spent four years as Associate Director, NERA Economic Consulting and had an earlier career for over 20 years at SPRU.  He is an economist specialising in energy and environmental economics, with degrees in economics from the Universities of Cambridge and Sussex.  His academic career has focused on the economics and policy issues of electricity and especially nuclear power, in which he has published and broadcast widely. He has frequently been Specialist Adviser or invited witness before House of Commons Select Committee inquiries on energy subjects.

Derek Osborn CB

Derek is a senior environmentalist advising on long-term strategic issues for governments, international bodies, business and the voluntary sector. He is President of the Stakeholder Forum for Our Common Future, Chairman of Cynnal Cymru - Sustain Wales, and a member of other boards in the private and voluntary sectors. Previously, he held senior roles in the arena of environmental protection: he served as Director General for environmental protection with the Department of the Environment, chaired the board of the European Environment Agency, and was a board member of the Environment Agency for England and Wales, having been involved in its early set-up. As a member of the European Economic and Social Committee, he was also the first chair of its Sustainable Development Observatory.

David Sigsworth OBE FRSE

David is non-executive Chair of a number of companies including the property and urban regeneration specialist Sigma Capital Group plc and the Central Market Agency Ltd, which administers the market for water and wastewater retail services in Scotland.  Previously he chaired the Scottish Fuel Poverty Strategic Working Group, which advised the Scottish Government on future policy. He is a Director of The Heat Trust, Vice-President of the Association for Decentralised Energy and a former main board director of Scottish & Southern Energy. He is an honorary Professor at the University of Dundee, involved in MSc courses covering sustainable energy and environmental modelling, as well as joint Chair of the Energy Technology Partnership in Scotland, based at the University of Strathclyde.

Xiao Yu

Xiao is a Fellow of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and a Certified Enterprise Risk Actuary with more than 10 years’ experience in the financial service fields. She has worked for several global consultancies including McKinsey, PwC and Aon, specialising in advising various insurers, re-insurers, asset managers and banks on financial analysis and strategies. She also has extensive experience in auditing, actuarial modelling and risk management. She has an keen interest in environmental issues and customer protection initiatives. She is currently Senior Product and Insurance Risk Manager at Prudential UK, previously she was Principle Consultant at PwC.

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