John is an economic consultant who has worked in central government and the privatised water and rail industries.
His early career was in the Government Economic Service (GES) carrying out appraisals of transport projects, including the Channel Tunnel. Subsequent areas of work included local government finance, environmental protection and, finally, water privatisation. He then spent 12 years in the privatised water and rail sectors, first as regulation director at Anglian Water, and then with Railtrack, in both cases leading work on their respective first price reviews.
As a member of the Competition Commission between 2005 and 2013 he worked on a number of high profile merger cases, market inquiries and regulatory appeal cases.
As a consultant, he has advised publicly-owned water utilities in Scotland and Northern Ireland on strategic, regulatory and governance issues and has also worked with Water UK on industry initiatives.
In recent years, he has carried out a series of studies for the RAC Foundation, a research charity, on road reforms, focussing on international experience in the provision and funding of national road networks. He is an associate of Indepen Consulting Ltd.
He joined the Board of Groundwork London in 2010 having previously been board member and honorary treasurer of Groundwork North London.