Michael Matheson was born in Glasgow in 1970 and educated at St John Bosco Secondary School. He went on to study at Queen Margaret College, Edinburgh, where he obtained a BSc in Occupational Therapy. He also holds a BA and a Diploma in Applied Social Sciences from the Open University.

Prior to becoming an MSP, Mr Matheson practised as a Community Occupational Therapist with Stirling Council, Central Regional Council, and Highland Regional Council.

He was elected as the MSP for Falkirk West following the May 2007 elections. Prior to this, he was a Regional MSP for Central Scotland from 1999 to 2007. Before being appointed Minister for Public Health and Sport, Mr Matheson was Vice Convenor of the European and External Relations Committee. He also sat on the Scottish Parliament's Health and Sport Committee, and previously served on the Justice and Enterprise and Culture Committees. Michael Matheson was appointed Cabinet Secretary for Justice in November 2014 and reappointed in May 2016. He was appointed Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Infrastructure and Connectivity in June 2018.

Robert liaises with all levels of Government and transport providers, advocates for the best deal for transport users, and uses our insight to secure improvements for transport users. He joined Transport Focus in 1999, after eighteen years working for British Rail.

Favourite journey: a hark back to childhood days during the summer holidays when we would join a mystery bus tour from Motherwell to some unknown exotic destination. The mystery lasted a few minutes - if the bus turned right it meant Troon or Saltcoats, left it meant Portobello. Happy days!

Ralph Roberts has been at the helm of McGill’s since April 2010.

Prior to that he worked for 10 years with Arriva Plc in a number of leadership roles in the bus and rail divisions.

He is Chair of CPT Scotland, Traveline Scotland, the Scottish Smart & Integrated Ticketing steering group, Album in Scotland. He is a former Chair of Gourock Community Council, the FTA in Scotland and the DVSA Operator Liaison Group. He stood as a councillor in the 2012 Scottish local elections.

He has two engineering degrees, lives in Gourock on the banks of the River Clyde and if he had spare time, would spend it camping, walking, racing classic motorcycles and flying his Gyrocopter.

Helen is Managing Director of Lumo – the new name for First Group’s London to Edinburgh rail operator.  She was previously Managing Director of East Coast Trains, having been appointed to that role in March 2020.

Prior to that Helen was Chief Commercial and Chief Engagement Officer with former Transport Systems Catapult now Connected Places Catapult.  She was also Managing Director UK & Ireland for Benelux company BringMe. During her career, Helen has specialised in shaping and delivering high-yield transformation, start-up, turnaround and growth strategies in both smaller companies and FTSE 100 players across the Telecommunications, Technology, Financial Services, Retail and Logistics arenas.

Prior to BringMe Helen was Sales & Marketing Director for Parcelforce Worldwide. Helen has also worked as a Non-Executive Director and independent consultant, both in the UK and internationally.

In addition, Helen has worked in a number of senior commercial positions at Lloyds TSB, ADT Tyco, O2 and Vodafone.

In 2019 Helen received the Women Business Leaders Award for Technology and Digital.

Tony has responsibility for SFT’s activity across infrastructure strategy, place and economy. He is an MBA with over 30 years’ experience advising both the public and private sectors on complex infrastructure projects in Scotland as well as in the rest of the UK and overseas.

Prior to joining SFT he was a Director in the Infrastructure Finance team at a leading global advisory consultancy where he advised on the financial and commercial aspects of major infrastructure investments.

Tony leads the following workstream areas:

Asset Strategy and Workplace
Infrastructure Strategy
Place
Housing
Economic Investment
Real Estate

Lorna joined HS2 in April 2017 as the Director of Phase Two Sponsorship and is responsible for the sponsorship and policy advice across Phase 2a and Phase 2b. She leads the interfaces with DfT Sponsors and Senior Stakeholder relationships, to ensure the delivery and safeguarding of the HS2 business cases and the optimisation and protection of their benefits.

An Architect by profession, Lorna has over 30 years’ experience in both the public and private sector and has sat at all sides of the table in major infrastructure schemes. Lorna joins HS2 from a specialist transformation consultancy where she was Transport Sector Leader, most recently leading engagements with Manchester, and Heathrow Airports. Previous to that role she was the Short-Haul Strategic Programmes Director for British Airways and also spent six years at Ernst & Young, where she led engagements on some of the largest and most complex programmes across the UK, including the London Olympics, Glasgow Commonwealth Games and Nuclear Decommissioning.

Henry is a technology strategist, systems engineer, engineering & programme manager (APMP qualified), experienced in leading teams to design and develop innovative solution to meet customer challenges, setting strategic direction and investment priorities, and launching strategic initiatives to develop key technical discriminators to drive future growth.

His technical background includes understand customer/end user needs and solution identification; systems development lifecycle (concept->design->implementation->integration), and integrated technology experimentation & evaluation.

A Mechanical Engineering graduate committed to accelerating the transition to a sustainable future. A strong and active interest in electric vehicles and Connected Automated Vehicles and the associated infrastructure. 

Simon has over 25 years of experience in leading innovative digital transformation and smart cities programmes. In 2012 he helped deliver Innovate UK's £24m Future Cities Demonstrator in Glasgow.

Simon's principal focus is demonstrating how technology and data can create integrated, digital services that meet the changing needs of citizens, communities and businesses, in areas such as transport, planning, energy and housing.

He co-founded UrbanTide and created USMART specifically to meet the growing urban challenges of the 21st-century. USMART unlocks siloed data with advanced sharing capabilities, from API curation to open data publication. It integrates and applies machine learning and AI algorithms to automate insights and help people and places work better and smarter. He understands that data is only one part of the challenge, he provides data training and maturity modelling to improve organisational skills and develop data initiatives that make interconnected smart places.

Strategic communications professional with over thirteen years of corporate, government and parliamentary experience, together with Masters and First Class undergraduate degrees in Politics.

Experienced in the successful design and delivery of communications programmes, including government, parliamentary and stakeholder engagement, and internal communications, media, social media and marketing, across a range of sectors, including rail, aviation, energy, manufacturing and foreign affairs.