WRM | Strategic Advisory Group

Simon is a Chartered Civil Engineer with over 16 years’ experience in the water environment and development planning sector, with particular technical expertise in flood risk and surface water management. He leads WSP’s Water Consulting business in the UK and has a proven ability in the management and delivery of water environment projects. He has gained experience throughout the project lifecycle, taking projects from concept stage, through planning, to design, construction and operation. Simon enjoys working closely with clients, communities and stakeholders to find long-term solutions, that lessen the blight of flooding, promote sustainable development and make society better. At present he is working on a number of R&D projects with academic and private sector partners applying innovative, technology led solutions to complex flood risk management challenges.

Ant Gould is a director at Full Circle Corporate Communications and a specialist in journalism, publishing and media relations. Previous roles include director of faculties at the Chartered Insurance Institute where he led market and membership engagement, and group editor in chief of insurance at Incisive Media overseeing all print, digital and event content for titles including Insurance Post, Insurance Age, Professional Broking, The Actuary, Reinsurance, Cover and Employee Rewards & Benefits.  Other roles have included editor of Post Magazine, news editor of The Engineer, and deputy editor of AutoTrade along with general news writing.

Alex is passionate about promoting the use of Nature Based Solutions across our landscape to solve problems and improve our hydrological readiness alongside promoting inclusiveness and access to nature. Alex advocated the use of digital tools to improve solutions; not just in terms of design but also partner engagement and socio-economic benefits of end users. Alex is a specialist in Natural Flood Management (NFM) and promotes Nature Based Solutions in major infrastructure projects. Alex works across a range of projects from leading river restorations schemes and NFM geospatial assessments to supporting major infrastructure schemes with drainage design and review, flood risk assessments and water chapters of EIAs. Alex is experienced across multiple aspects of Flood Risk Management Design and Appraisal in Coastal, Fluvial and Pluvial environments.

Jo Bradley has worked on many aspects of water management during her 30-year career in the UK. She completed 28 years at the Environment Agency where she focussed on many pollution prevention topics but in the last decade, Jo’s attention has been on pollution from urban surfaces and roads. She worked for SDS Limited for four years, specifying stormwater treatment devices in SuDS schemes and in September 2020, she became Director of Operations for Stormwater Shepherds UK where she is now dedicated to the pursuit of better stormwater management, and the development of a funding mechanism to deliver that management.

Howard is a passionate advocate for urban trees, having planted his first tree nearly 45 years ago. Understanding the many conflicting claims on the space in our towns and cities, he works across the many stakeholders to achieve the best possible chance for every tree to grow to its species potential. Enthusiastically promoting proven green infrastructure planting methodologies, presenting to a wide range of different disciplines in many countries globally, he views himself as an active ambassador for GreenBlue Urban.