CBI Higher Education Taskforce members

Sam Laidlaw (Chairman)

Chief executive, Centrica

Sam Laidlaw joined Centrica plc as Chief Executive in July 2006. He is Chairman of the Executive Committee and the Disclosure Committee. He was previously Executive Vice President of the Chevron Corporation, Chief Executive Officer at Enterprise Oil and...more

Madeleine Atkins

Vice chancellor, Coventry University

Madeleine Atkins studied law and history as an undergraduate at Cambridge University before qualifying as a secondary teacher. Following various post-doctoral research positions, she became a lecturer in education management at Newcastle University....more

Glynis Breakwell

Vice-chancellor, Bath University

Professor Breakwell took her PhD from the University of Bristol and DSc from the University of Oxford. In 2003, in recognition of the significance of her contribution to the social sciences, she was awarded an honorary doctorate of laws from the Univers...more

Chris Brinsmead

Chairman, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals UK

Chris Brinsmead has been the President of AstraZeneca UK since 2002. Prior to this he held a variety of marketing and senior management roles with AstraZeneca. He is also President of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry. He holds a BS...more

Melfort Campbell

CEO, Imes Group

Melfort Campbell is Chairman and Chief Executive of Imes Group, which he established in 1985. During the last 20 years he has evolved the Company from its origins as Water Weights – a novel technology for testing crane-lifting integrity – to...more

Johnny Cameron

Johnny Cameron was appointed to the Board of Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc in March 2006, Johnny Cameron joined RBS from Dresdner Kleinwort Benson in 1998. In 2000, he was appointed Deputy Chief Executive of Corporate Banking & Financial Mark...more

Ian Cheshire

Group chief executive, Kingfisher

Ian was appointed Group Chief Executive of Kingfisher plc in January 2008. Prior to this he was Chief Executive of B&Q from June 2005.   His previous roles at Kingfisher include Chief Executive of International and Development, Chief Exe...more

Iain Coucher

Chief executive, Network Rail

Previously Managing Director of Network Rail, Iain Coucher became Deputy Chief Executive of Network Rail when it acquired Railtrack PLC in October 2002. Iain has responsibility for all day-to-day operations. Previously, Iain was Chief Executive of Tu...more

Steve Easterbrook

President and CEO, McDonald's Restaurants Ltd

Steve was appointed President and CEO of McDonald’s UK in April 2006 and President, Northern Division, McDonald’s Europe in January 2007 with responsibility for the UK, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland and the Republic of Ireland. S...more

Gordon Frazer

Managing director, UK, Microsoft

Gordon has been Managing Director of Microsoft UK since 31 July, 2006. In 2001, Gordon Frazer took the Outstanding Contributor Award at Microsoft's global sales convention. He also won the Leadership Award. Gordon Frazer was General Manager of Micro...more