OPENING SESSION:

Richard was appointed Head of UPP Foundation in July 2016 and was promoted to Director in 2018. Working with the trustees, he sets its strategy and leads on all aspects of the UPP Foundation’s activities. Richard joined UPP in 2015 as Business Development Manager and his responsibilities included setting up the UPP Foundation. Prior to joining UPP, he was Head of Policy at the University of Hertfordshire, advising the Vice-Chancellor and senior management team and leading the University’s public affairs function. Before this, he worked as a researcher for two MPs in Parliament. He graduated from the University of Essex in 2007 and holds an MRes in Public Policy and Management from Birkbeck, University of London.

Michelle was appointed Minister of State for Universities at the Department of Education on 13 February 2020.
She was previously Government Whip (Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury) from 29 July 2019 to 13 February 2020. She was also an unpaid Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Education covering the maternity leave of Kemi Badenoch MP from 4 September 2019 to 13 February 2020.

Previous roles have included work within the private sector developing digital strategies and solutions for global corporate clients. She spent five years consulting in the Cabinet Office, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and then DCLG developing national innovation programmes for local government and leading research and product development for interactive TV public services.

Lord Bilimoria is President of the CBI. He is the Founding Chairman of the UK India Business Council, a Deputy Lieutenant of Greater London, a former Chancellor of Thames Valley University (now the University of West London); he was the youngest University Chancellor in the UK when appointed. Karan was a former Senior Non-Executive Director of the Booker Group now TESCO PLC (2007-2016); he is one of the first two visiting entrepreneurs at the University of Cambridge; he is a founding member of the Prime Minister of India’s Global Advisory Council. In 2006, Karan Bilimoria was appointed the Lord Bilimoria of Chelsea, making him the first ever Zoroastrian Parsi to sit in the House of Lords. In 2008 he was awarded the Pravasi Bharti Samman by the President of India. He is an Honorary Fellow of Sidney Sussex College Cambridge and was Chair of the Advisory Board of the Judge Business School, Cambridge University from 2015-2020 and subsequently appointed as an Honorary Ambassador.

Andy is Professor of Government Practice and Vice Dean for Social Responsibility in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Manchester. He is a Visiting Professor of Further and Higher Education at the University of Wolverhampton and a Governor at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research. He is also an expert adviser to the EU and has worked regularly for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
He has recently worked as a specialist adviser to the Select Committees on Economic Affairs and Digital Skills in the House of Lords. He has also been a special adviser to ministers on education, skills and science policy at the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills, and a senior adviser at HM Treasury and in the Departments for Education and Communities and Local Government. He writes regularly for Wonkhe, the Times Education Supplement, the Times Higher Education magazine and The Guardian.

Lord (Bob) Kerslake is Chair of the Board of Governors for Sheffield Hallam University. He also chairs the UK2070 Commission into city and regional inequalities as well as recently leading the UPP Foundation’s Civic University Commission. Before joining the Civil Service, Lord Kerslake received a knighthood for his services to local government, spending eight years serving the London Borough of Hounslow and then a further 11 years leading Sheffield Council.