Mr. John Dauth took up the appointment of High Commissioner to the United Kingdom in September 2008. He was previously High Commissioner to New Zealand (2006 – 08). Prior to this he was Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York (2001 – 06) and Deputy Secretary in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (1998 – 2001).

Mr. Dauth has served in a number of positions overseas including as High Commissioner to Malaysia (1993 – 96), Consul-General, Australian Consulate-General, Noumea (1986 – 87), Charge d'Affaires, Australian Embassy, Tehran (1983 – 85), First Secretary, Australian Embassy, Islamabad (1974 – 76) and Third (later Second) Secretary, Australian Embassy, Lagos (1970 – 72). From 1977 – 1980, Mr. Dauth worked on secondment to Buckingham Palace as Assistant Press Secretary to the Queen and Press Secretary to the Prince of Wales.

Mr. Dauth has also held a number of positions in Canberra, including First Assistant Secretary, South and South-East Asia Division (1996 – 98), First Assistant Secretary, International Security Division (1991 – 93), Chief of Staff to the Minister for Foreign Affairs (1989 – 91), Assistant Secretary, Public Affairs Branch (1987 – 89), and Head, Commonwealth and Multilateral Organizations Section (1980 – 82). He joined the then Department of External Affairs in 1969.

Mr. Dauth was born in 1947. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Sydney.

Philip Aiken is Chairman of Robert Walters plc, a Non Executive Director of Kazakhmys plc, National Grid plc and Essar Energy plc. Until his retirement at the end of 2006, he worked for BHP Billiton for nine and a half years as Group President Energy and before that as President BHP Petroleum. Prior to BHP Billiton, Philip was with BTR Nylex for two and a half years and The BOC Group for 26 years. He was formerly Senior Advisor to Macquarie Capital and Mielyn Express Offshore, Chairman of the 2004 World Energy Congress Organising Committee, an Advisor to the Governor of Guangdong and a Director of Mt Eliza Business.

He has a BE (Chem) from the University of Sydney and attended the AMP at Harvard Business School.

Alex graduated from Newcastle University in 2007 with a degree in Economics and Business Management. Whilst at Newcastle he won the North East Young Enterprise award for his role in founding the most profitable company in its history.

He joined PricewaterhouseCoopers and qualified as an ACA in 2009. He worked in both Audit, where his clients included FTSE 100 TMT clients and Transaction Services, where he worked within the financial services sector on a number of large PE deals. He joined Cavendish in 2010 and worked as part of the execution team. He currently works for RBS. 

Alex won his position on the Australian Business board by winning the “outstanding individual” prize of the “Challenge 2010” competition sponsored by Qantas. Alex was also part of the winning team, Team 2, who organised the “Future Leaders Fete.”

John Burton is the Director in charge of Westfield's Stratford City project which represents the company’s single, biggest ever investment in a project at £1.45b.

Westfield Stratford City will form the gateway to the Olympic Park.  On completion it will be the largest urban retail and leisure destination in Europe and will also have the capacity to deliver up to 250,000sqm of hotel, office and residential development.

He has worked for Westfield for 16 years. Over the past 9 years he has lead development projects for the company throughout the UK.
 
Before moving to the UK he was in charge of Westfield's development of an internet shopping mall and before that he worked on Westfield's potential entry into the Japanese shopping centre market.  Prior to this he undertook several shopping centre redevelopments in the Australian market.
 
He had previously worked in the business and property development of many of Australia's major airports and was involved with the establishment of Australia's Federal Airports Corporation.
 
John holds a Bachelor of Arts (Accounting) and a Master of Business in Finance degrees.

Lynton Crosby is Co-Founder of the Crosby|Textor Group

Lynton Crosby is one of the most highly regarded strategists working in the world today. In 2005 he was awarded the Order of Australia (AO) in recognition of his achievements.

Lynton has worked for FTSE100 and ASX companies, brought in to counsel strategy and direct research. His work has included multi-million dollar programs; public affairs work; as well as lobbying.  His clients included QANTAS, Macquarie Group and Coles

He was dubbed ‘the Australian Karl Rove’ by George W. Bush for his work for John Howard (elected four times as Australian Prime Minister) He is renowned for turning around Boris Johnson’s 2008 campaign for London Mayor and, advising Zimbabwean Opposition Leader Morgan Tsvangirai.  His reputation is built on discretion, drive and discipline.

When he is not directing campaigns, Lynton is speaking, writing or appearing on television.  He is still innovating – pioneering values-based research in the UK, the latest Real-Time Response language testing in Australia, and new methods of segmenting and targeting the ‘swing’ voters

Mike is a director at PwC who has been advising clients on both domestic and international corporate and personal tax for over 20 years. Mike has helped clients determine their strategy and has particular knowledge and specialism in assisting small and medium enterprises and entrepreneurs generally on UK and international taxation.

Mike works closely with London & Partners/UKTI and various other agencies, providing support and technical materials as well as presenting at conferences on setting up businesses in the UK.  Mike also edits the Doing Business in the UK guide for PwC as well as the HSBC/PwC Doing Business Guides which aim to help overseas business to develop their strategies when entering new markets.

Prior to joining Austrade in late 2009, Kym spent 12 years as the Managing Director of a Space Launch Australia, a private investment and consulting company with business interests in Australia, Brazil, Russia, USA and central Europe. Kym also held Senior Executive Service positions in the Australian Government Industry Portfolio, managing areas responsible for industry policy, collaboration with North and South Asia, sustainable development, and industry issues relating to the space, environment, marine and renewable energy sectors.

Kym has served on the Boards of a range of companies and government organisations (including the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation), was a member of the Australian Government Delegation which negotiated the initial United Nations’ Framework Convention on Climate Change (Rio Summit) and has worked at the OECD in Paris.

Kym has a B.Sc (Hons) and commenced his career as a medical physicist at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney.

Chris Hickey is a Managing Director at Robert Walters plc, based in London. Chris joined Robert Walters in 2000, having previously worked as a solicitor in Australia, and latterly in the UK and Switzerland with Lehman Brothers. At Robert Walters, Chris has responsibility for the day to day operations of the Group’s UK offices, in addition to Robert Walters’ South African operations; with divisions including: financial services, commerce accountancy, IT, HR, legal, risk & compliance, and sales & marketing. 

Chris graduated with a BA, and also an LLB (Hons) from Bond University in Australia, and subsequently qualified as a solicitor after completing a two year training contract in Australia. Chris is married and has lived in the UK for 12 years

Tom Homer - Chief Executive Officer, EMEA
Tom Homer is Chief Executive Officer for Telstra International EMEA, based in London where he is responsible for developing and driving the overall business strategy for the region.
Tom has over 20 years’ experience in IT and telecommunications including 10 years managing relationships with multinational enterprises at AT&T combined with a range of senior roles at Energis.
After Energis’ acquisition by Cable and Wireless, Tom became Director of the Major System Integrator channel. He then joined Reliance Globalcom (formerly Vanco) as Director of Client Management before taking up the post of Managing Director – UK and Nordics in 2009.

Geoff O'Connell was CEO for Europe and Africa for Hot Tuna Plc until December 2011. 

Arrived in 1993, on a ‘grandparent entry permit’ for a short holiday.

He became the first Australian to work for the UK based, Adam Smith Institute; opened the Moscow office of the Adam Smith Institute.

Active member of Australian Business, ABIE, Australia New Zealand Chamber of Commerce for over 10 years.

Trustee of the MV Havengore (Havengore carried Winstons Churchill’s coffin) and it’s charity HELM working with out placed youth in the Medway area.

Corporate sponsor and mentor to Hampstead Theatre Youth Education Trust.
The trust works to educate youth into the business community via business mentoring across the areas of fashion design, financial management and personal leadership skills.

Dick Porter is a co-founder of STA TRAVEL which he managed as CEO until 2007 and continues to serve as a Director of the STA Travel Group.

Dick is the Chairman of Griffin Global Holdco Ltd which is the private equity backed leading travel specialist for the marine and offshore industries;

Chairman and investor in Top Deck Tours Ltd which is a youth tour operator operating in Europe, Australia and New Zealand;

Trustee of the UK Friends of the University of Western Australia;

Member of the Advisory Council of the Business School of the University of Western Australia; 

Advisor and investor in three European on-line ventures;

Chairman of the British Educational Travel Association (BETA) which is the professional association representing the youth, student and educational travel sector; 

Director and adviser to a number of other companies reflecting his private interests.

Presently an Adviser to Boards and senior executives, Patricia Rochford has had a highly successful career as an international Executive Search Consultant, entrepreneur, Psychologist and Board Director. 

Before she moved to London, Patricia’s leading boutique executive search firm, the Sydney based Rochford International, consulted to organisations around the world including in Hong Kong, the UK, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark, Argentina and the USA. Her wide range of clients have included: international companies e.g. IBM, Exxon, Coca Cola, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Bunge, Brambles, QBE, UBS, Morgan Grenfell; major national companies e.g. China Light and Power (CLP), ANZ, Stockland, Fairfax; professional firms including Towers Perrin, Clayton Utz, KPMG; academic institutions (UNSW, NSWIT); Arts organisations (Australia Opera, Sydney Theatre Company); and government bodies (the ABC, Sydney Olympic bid, Kowloon-Canton Railway.

Her non-executive Director appointments have included the NSW State Rail Authority, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Tourism, Art Gallery Society of NSW, and University of New South Wales (UNSW).

Peter is Head of Transaction Banking, Europe for Australia and New Zealand Bank tasked with
devising and driving strategy and executing against the Transaction Banking business plan.

He joined ANZ from Lloyds TSB where he was head of Sales for Corporate Transaction Services.
Peter spent 7 years at Citigroup as Head of Trade Sales, Europe, where he was responsible for
leading the banks sales to European and Global corporate clients. He joined Citi from ABN Amro
where he was head of UK Trade for Commodities, Export Credit and Trade Finance. His formative
years were spent at Royal Bank of Scotland in a variety of roles.

He is a regular speaker and trainer on a variety of topics including International Trade, Sales and
Working Capital. He has previously acted as an adviser to the UK Government on Trade policy
matters.

Married with 2 children, his hobbies include climbing mountains, martial arts, watching football and
rugby.

Peter Shore is Chairman of Arqiva. He was previously CEO of Media and Communications Partners Ltd, a 50/50 Joint Venture between Macquarie Bank and the Canadian Pension Plan, who jointly own two major telecoms and broadcasting companies in the UK, Arqiva and Airwave. Peter is Chairman of both these companies.

He has been in the UK since early 2007, when he was appointed an Executive Director at Macquarie Bank,  responsible for its media and telecom investments in the UK and Europe. He has been in the communications industry for 30 years. He was formerly a Group Managing Director of Telstra from 1994-2000, and Director of Foxtel. He was Chairman of the travel company Lonely Planet and the Australian listed companies, Unwired Australia and Hostworks. He worked with Investec Bank in Sydney from 2004-7 and was also on the Australian Advisory Board of Siemens.

Damian is the Managing Director, UK, of The Highland Group, a global management consultancy specialising in operational performance improvement.

Damian has more than twenty years’ international experience as a chartered accountant and management consultant. He started his career in Australia with the accountancy firm Arthur Young and was appointed Partner in 1984. With the merger of Arthur Young and Ernst & Whinney in 1990, Damian was seconded to New York to support the post-merger integration programme. As the Director of Tax in the Ernst & Young Global Office, Damian was responsible for strategy formulation and execution to grow the business across key geographies, industries and service lines.

After a short time back in Australia, Damian rejoined the E&Y Global Office, this time based in London to lead a major business development programme in Europe.

In 2005, Damian joined Management Consulting Group Plc as Senior Vice-President and in 2008 joined The Highland Group where he is now responsible for the growth and profitability of the firm in the UK.

Damian is also a non-executive director of Arqiva Ltd. which owns all the television and radio broadcast infrastructure and much of the mobile phone infrastructure in the UK   He holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of New South Wales and is a member of the Institutes of Chartered Accountants in Australia and in England & Wales.

Associate Professor Jill Watts is the Chief Executive Officer for Ramsay Health Care, UK. 

Jill began her healthcare career as a Registered Nurse and Midwife and has over 30 years’ experience in the sector. She is a Wharton Fellow and has an MBA as well as post graduate qualifications in Health Administration and Information Systems.

In 2010 Jill was voted the most influential leader in the UK independent health sector as part of the Health Investor Power 50 Awards.

During her career Jill has held a number of senior roles including being CEO of Australia’s largest private tertiary teaching hospital Greenslopes and Chairman of the Gallipoli Research Foundation.  Jill is currently Chair of the NHS Partners Network and a Board Member of Australian Business in the UK.

Ramsay Health Care is one of the world’s largest hospital operators with 119 facilities located in Australia, UK, Indonesia and France. Ramsay is listed in the top 100 Australian companies with annualized revenues of approximately $3.4 billion

Michael is a corporate and capital markets partner in the London office of Minter Ellison, the leading Australian law firm.

Michael also holds the following positions:

Director, Australian Business (he was President of ABIE 1984-1985 and Chairman of the ANZCC 1993 – 1996)
Chairman and trustee, The Sir Robert Menzies Memorial Trust
Trustee, Friends of the University of Melbourne Charitable Trust
Trustee, Royal Flying Doctor Service Friends in the United Kingdom

His contributions were recognised in 2006 with an invitation to attend the 100 Leading Global Australians Summit in Sydney.

He was responsible for the merger of Australian Business and the Australia and New Zealand Chamber of Commerce to form a single business group in the United Kingdom, Australian Business, in 2005.

He was a member of the Australia and New Zealand Trade Advisory Committee (UK Board of Trade) from 1990 to 2002 and is a past Chairman of the Cook Society.

He is married with two children and his interests include opera and music, art, antiques and antiquarian books, skiing and aviation (he is an instrument rated private pilot).  He is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts.

Arthur was appointed UK Human Resources Director, National Australia Bank on 1 March 2008.  This role encompasses the Leadership and Strategic direction of a professional HR function delivering a full range of generalist and specialist HR services that are aligned with the business objectives of client Business Units and the Group overall.  As well as being a member of the UK Executive Committee Arthur also sits on the UK Risk and Assets & Liabilities Committees.

Prior to this appointment, Arthur held the position of General Manager, Group Executive Programs, reporting to the Group Executive and the Remuneration Committee of the Principal Board, and he was based in Melbourne.

Born and educated in Melbourne (Master of Applied Finance, Master of Professional Accounting, (both Monash University) and accredited CPA status). He is married with two children.  He enjoys swimming, jogging, cycling, travel and music.

In November 2010 Paul was appointed to the role of Regional General Manager, UK & Ireland for Qantas Airways. His key areas of responsibility are revenue growth, sales, marketing, ground operations and overall strategic development of Qantas in the region.

Paul has 20 years experience in the airline industry gained with some of the largest and most innovative global airlines. He has held management positions with American Airlines, British Airways, Air New Zealand and Ansett Australia.

Paul holds a Masters degree with distinction in Business Administration from the University of Liverpool as well as a BA (Hons.) in French.

He serves as a director of QH Tours UK Limited and has also served on a number of other diverse industry boards and committees.

Paul was born in London and has spent extended periods overseas including Australia, France and Germany. His interests include travelling and sport and he is a former rock drummer with a number of North London touring bands.

Jeffrey Young (40) founded London-based research consultancy Allegra Strategies Limited in September 1998 and is currently the Director. 

Jeffrey holds a business degree in Finance and Economics and an MBA (with Distinction) from the University of Houston. Jeffrey has worked within research and strategy consulting for the past 12 years having managed an extensive range of research projects within the retail, leisure and consumer lifestyle sectors and plays a hands on role in Allegra’s consumer research teams.  Key clients include: Marks & Spencer, Tesco, Vodafone, British Telecom, Disney and Starbucks Coffee Company.

Prior to setting up Allegra Strategies, Jeffrey spent 3 years as a strategy consultant with London-based Burlington Consultants and as a freelance consultant with Roland Berger & Partners. Jeffrey's early career began in the hospitality industry where he completed studies at the Ryde College of Hotel and Catering Management in Sydney, NSW Australia.

Jeffrey also holds directorships in recruitment firm, Maverick Human Resources Limited and Australian Business, a business networking organisation affiliated with the Australian High Commission.

Jeffrey is frequently invited to feature on TV, BBC radio and in mainstream newsprint to provide commentary and analysis on major UK retail trends.