Towards Excellence Conference 2023

Tuesday 23 May 2023; 8:30am to 4:30pm

Stock Brook Manor Country Club.

Agenda

Speaker biographies

Ben Julian Harrington QPM
Essex Police Chief Constable

Brought up in North London and educated at Saint Ignatius College in Enfield, Ben-Julian - or ‘BJ’, started policing when he joined the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) in 1990 as a Police Constable in the then Chingford and Walthamstow Division of North East London. He brought with him experience working in Customs and Excise as well as having been a reserve soldier in the Parachute Regiment.

Serving for 27 years across London BJ worked in a variety of roles. As a response officer and then on the Territorial Support Group in North London, where he gained his first promotion to Sergeant in 1996. He subsequently worked through the ranks to Area Commander for North West London in October 2014.

With a firm base in operational policing, he led the Tottenham High Road and the Broad water Farm Estate team. He then proceeded to become Chief Inspector in Operations at Paddington Green. He held responsibility for the Secure Counter Terrorist Custody suite, oversaw the implementation of Safer Neighbourhood Teams and oversaw the policing of Millwall Football Club whilst serving as Superintendent in charge of Crime and Operations in Lewisham. Finally, as the Borough Commander for Camden he was able to work closely with communities, policing a diverse and complex part of the capital.

He continues to lead, endorse, and enhance the Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion Strategy within Essex Police, which is reflected in the widely accoladed “We Value Difference“ Recruitment Campaign and gained a positive peer review by the College of Policing. As the Chief Officer lead and ally for the LGBTQ+ forum he is able to further support inclusivity.

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Roger Hirst
Essex Police & Fire Crime Commissioner

Roger Hirst was first elected as the Police and Crime Commissioner for Essex in May 2016.

Mr Hirst later became the first Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner in October 2017 and continues to work nationally and locally to build stronger links between emergency services and help create more secure communities.

Mr Hirst committed in his Police and Crime Plan to increase the local, visible and accessible nature of policing in Essex, crack down on anti-social behaviour and protect children and vulnerable people, as well as continuing to address domestic abuse, deal with gangs and serious violence, and improve road safety.

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Andy Prophet
Essex Police Deputy Chief Constable

Andy started his policing in 1996. He spent six brilliant years as a patrol officer in Thurrock, getting to know local communities and understanding the importance just doing the basics well. Following a promotion to sergeant, he moved to Southend, where he worked in the custody suite and then led a proactive team tackling drug-driven dealing, burglary and other violent street crime.

Andy’s policing journey progressed largely in the south and west of the county, with roles at Rayleigh, Basildon, Rochford, Grays, Harlow, Loughton and Brentwood.

Andy is now the Deputy Chief Constable and responsible for, amongst other things, public confidence and community engagement. Andy is also the national policing lead for shaping the response to anti-social behaviour in communities. In his spare time Andy loves playing cricket, eating good food, and spending time relaxing with his family.

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Rachel Nolan
Essex Police Assistant Chief Constable

Rachel joined Essex Police in 1998 where she worked at Canvey Island and Rayleigh, before becoming a Sergeant there working at Benfleet and Rochford. In 2006 she was supported by local Rotary Clubs to spend time in South Africa and Lesotho learning about cultural differences and diversity in policing.

Rachel completed the Strategic Command Course in 2020, passing with distinction, before being successful in her application as Assistant Chief Constable (Local Policing and Crime & Public Protection) in April 2020. She currently has responsibility for Local Policing, Special Constabulary and our Local Policing Support Unit.

Rachel is a Gold Commander for public order and CBRN and is a strategic firearms commander.

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Richard Leicester
Kent and Essex Police Director of Human Resources

Richard Leicester is Director of Human Resources is the Chief Officer lead on the development and delivery of strategic human resources and learning and development across both Kent Police and Essex Police.

Richard has overall strategic responsibility for:

• The development and implementation of corporate people and learning strategies
• The delivery of learning and development
• Recruitment and people resourcing
• Operational and strategic human resources delivery
• Occupational health services
• Talent management and people development
• Performance Improvement Units

Richard successfully completed the Strategic Command Course (SCC) in 2018, is a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and has substantial experience of leading both generalist and specialist human resource related functions.

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Claire Talbot
Essex Police Chief Superintendent

Claire Talbot is the Head of Professionalism at Essex Police. Claire is also the Essex Police tactical lead for tackling Violence against Women and Girls. Claire is working externally with partners to create safer spaces for our communities in public, private and online spaces as well as working internally to improve the trust and confidence in policing through addressing culture and behaviours.

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Naomi Edwards
Essex Police Superintendent

Naomi transferred to Essex Police in May 2021. She is the force strategic lead for Hate Crime, Anti-Social Behaviour and PREVENT. She has 18 years' experience in policing and has worked in some of London’s most diverse boroughs. Naomi's portfolios include Public Protection, Sexual Offences, High Harm offenders, Homicide, Organised Crime and Continuous improvement.

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Sonia Shaljean
Lads Need Dads Managing Director and Founder
Director of Operations

Prior to founding Lads Need Dads seven years ago, Sonia has worked within the statutory and voluntary sector in the field of criminal justice, drugs and alcohol, domestic abuse, anger management, homelessness and complex families for over 20 years.

She studied Criminology at Birkbeck University, London and is a trained and experienced alcohol and drugs counsellor, anger management specialist, group-worker and PTTLLS level 4 trainer, level 3 Designated Safeguarding officer, trained restorative practitioner and emotion coach. She is an experienced Funding and development manager, with a track record of successfully devising and setting up innovative projects both in London and Essex.

Sonia identified that many of the male clients she worked with over her career seemed to share a common factor of an absent father and wanted to do something about this so set about devising Lads Need Dads.

Sonia has a heart for prevention work. She is a fellow with the School of Social Entrepreneurs and is a Shackleton Foundation leader.

Sonia holds a Certificate of Education in Managing Charities and Social Enterprise with Anglia Ruskin University. She is also a Trustee with the Men and Boys Coalition which highlights and tackles issues where the needs of men and boys are unmet.

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Ron Lock
Detective Superintendent
National Police Chiefs' Council and College of Policing

Ron has 18 years Police service; he has worked across response and Neighbourhood Policing. Most of Ron’s Career has been Detective based. Ron joined the NPCC in January 2023 as Detective Superintendent for Community engagement and relations workstream coordinator.

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Wendy Williams CBE
His Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary
His Majesty's Inspector of Fire and Rescue Services

Wendy Williams is HM Inspector of Constabulary and HM Inspector of Fire & Rescue Services. She has responsibility for 13 police forces across Wales and the West of England and 11 fire and rescue services in the West of England. She was previously a Chief Crown Prosecutor with the Crown Prosecution Service and a solicitor and partner in private practice. 

Wendy Williams is also the author of the independent Windrush Lessons Learned Review into the Home Office and its handling of events leading up to the Windrush scandal. This was presented to Parliament in 2020. More recently, The Home Secretary invited Wendy to consider the progress made by the department in implementing her 30 recommendations, and her Windrush Lessons Learned Review Progress Update was published in 2022.

In 2020, she was appointed as a Non-executive Director of the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. In 2023, Wendy joined the Advisory Board for the University of Cambridge Judge Business School, as well as the Oxford and Cambridge Universities’ Close the Gap Advisory Board.

Wendy was awarded a CBE in the Queen’s New Year Honours list of 2021.

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Rabbi Irit Shillor

Irit Shillor is the long-standing Rabbi of the Harlow Jewish Community in Essex. After ordination she worked for many years in the German speaking world. Her greatest achievement there, she feels, was helping to rebuild the Jewish community and enabling progressive Judaism to grow in those countries. In Harlow she is engaged a great deal in Interfaith work besides her usual Rabbinic duties. Her most joyful moments are teaching adults and children, and enabling them to engage with the joys and challenges of Judaism. Irit has two wonderful daughters and lives with her wife and their two cats not far from Harlow.

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Councillor Luke Mackenzie
Mayor of Basildon

Luke was born and grew up in Basildon.

He attended St Teresa's Primary School in Basildon and then Mayflower High School in Billericay, where he also attended sixth form.

He then went to the University of Westminster where he studied Politics with Economics. While studying he worked at Hobbycraft in Basildon as a Supervisor on weekends.

Some of his career highlights include: Working for Stephen Metcalfe MP and Jackie Doyle-Price MP, The Association of Chief Police Officers, and then the National Police Chiefs’ Council. Starting in the Communications Office and then moving to the Business Support Office. Luke has been in local council since 2008 in various roles, he has served as Mayor since May 2022.In his free time, he enjoys motorcycling and yoga.

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