Annual Mortgage Conference 2026

Jackie is a NED and senior advisor with nearly 25 years of experience in the mortgage industry gained from working at UK Finance, mortgage lending firms and the Council of Mortgage Lenders. She was a part time senior advisor to UK Finance until early 2025 and was Director of Mortgages at UK Finance between 2018 and 2020. Jackie has a portfolio of non-executive and advisory roles. She is a non-executive director for the New Homes Quality Board, Chair of the Bank of England’s Residential Property Forum, and non-executive director for e4 Strategic Ltd. She also provides independent consultancy/advisory services for firms. In her earlier career Jackie worked for two different mortgage lenders in senior compliance roles and was Head of Policy at the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) for 10 years, working through the last financial crisis and delivering on a number of key initiatives related to mortgage regulation and supporting customers in financial difficulty. She was also Deputy Manager for property and household at Association of British Insurers (ABI), having spent her early career working in a variety of police and criminal policy roles at the Home Office. In June 2010, Jackie was awarded an OBE for services to the financial services industry in the Queen’s birthday honours list.

Tom Chaplin is a Senior Product Owner at Lloyds Banking Group, leading initiatives within the Homes Platform to modernise the UK home buying journey. He specialises in digital transformation across mortgages, conveyancing, and data exchange, working with industry, government, and technology partners to drive systemic change. Tom actively shaping strategy on tokenisation, verifiable credentials, and smart data to reduce friction, improve transparency, and accelerate completion times for customers and lenders alike.

Julian is a seasoned financial services executive focused on fintech and proptech innovation. As the COO and board member of Landbay Partners, the UK’s leading Prime Buy-to-Let marketplace mortgage lender, he has played a pivotal role in scaling the business, overseeing its growth to more than £4 billion in completed mortgages. Under his leadership, Landbay has earned multiple industry accolades, including four consecutive Best BTL Lender awards and recognition among Europe’s fastest-growing companies in the Financial Times FT1000 and The Times UK Fastest 100 Growing Technology Companies. 

Julian is also a non-executive director and adviser across the fintech and proptech sectors, with a passion for innovation in financial services. He brings over 30 years of experience, including senior roles at JPMorgan and Macquarie across New York, London, Tokyo, and Sydney. Outside of work, he’s an avid cyclist, skier, and classic car enthusiast.

Richard is a leading property industry figure best known for delivering insight and strategic advice on the residential and mortgage markets. He delivers advice and insight for industry and policy makers across emerging housing trends, housing development, mortgage lending and investment. He appears regularly in the media on the key aspects of housing that matter to Government, business and consumers. Richard started his career at Savills, then joined analytics business Hometrack which was acquired by ZPG Plc in 2017.

Frances Haque is the Chief Economist for Santander UK responsible for the economic analysis and macroeconomic forecasts used by the retail bank. Her team are responsible for developing: the analysis of economic risk scenarios to support the Prudential Regulatory Authority stress test and IFRS 9 processes; analysis for planning and strategic purposes; supporting the external customer work of the bank including speaking at a variety of events; and writing for external publications. She has also been appointed to the FCA’s CBA Panel. 

Prior to joining she worked for a variety of different institutions as a senior economist including, EY, BT, BBC, Ofcom and OFT. 

She also specialises in Competition and Regulatory economics and has appeared on BBC, Sky, ITV, CNBC and Bloomberg News, and Radio programmes including the Today, LBC and Times Radio programmes, providing commentary on published economic data and analysis.

Lewis Harris is Head of Strategic Solutions at Finova, one of the UK’s leading providers of cloud-based mortgage, savings and lending software. He plays a key role in shaping Finova’s pre-sales strategy, working closely with lenders to translate market challenges and customer needs into scalable, technology-driven solutions. 

Lewis brings extensive experience across banking and fintech, having held senior roles at Salesforce, nCino and HSBC. With a deep understanding of the evolving mortgage landscape, Lewis is focused on helping lenders modernise their operations, improve efficiency and deliver better customer outcomes. 

He is particularly passionate about the role of technology in driving innovation across the lending lifecycle and enabling firms to adapt in a rapidly changing market.

Angela is Head of Government & Public Affairs (UK) at PEXA and a dual-qualified conveyancer with extensive experience across residential property law, legal practice and market reform. She brings a strong understanding of the operational and consumer challenges facing the conveyancing sector.

After beginning her career in practice, Angela transitioned into consultancy, advising startups and established organisations on digital transformation and the modernisation of conveyancing processes, with a focus on improving efficiency, transparency and security.

In her current role, Angela works closely with government, regulators and industry bodies to support the continued evolution of a secure, efficient and trusted property market.

Angela holds several senior industry and independent roles, including Executive Member of the Open Property Data Association, Co-Chair of the Digital Identity Working Group of the Digital Property Market Steering Group, and professional member of the CILEX Disciplinary Tribunal. She is also an active participant in the Home Buying and Selling Council.

Paula founded the HomeOwners Alliance in 2012 to restore trust in home ownership by lobbying for policies and industry practices to get a better deal for homeowners and those who aspire to own. Her website is one of Britain's most popular property advice websites providing guidance, tools and services to homeowners and prospective buyers. She provides leadership and strategic vision driving the organisation forward and has built a strong team. A respected commentator and advocate for homeowners and is regularly quoted in the media and appears on radio and TV. Paula is also a board member of the Leasehold Advisory Service and the Shared Ownership Council.

Rachael Hunnisett is the Director of Mortgage Distribution at April Mortgages, a Dutch backed UK Mortgage lender dedicated to championing change and distrupting the status quo, well known last year for launching 7x LTI and launching 100% mortgage lending for first time buyer and home movers in May 2025. Rachael is a multi-award winning finance professional with a career spanning mortgage broking, lending, distribution, and green finance. She has built a reputation for innovation, straight-talking, partnership and, in her own words, unapolagetically driving accessibility to homeownership. At April, Rachael leads their distribution strategy - championing a fresh, simplified approach to mortgages. Since joining April in 2024, Rachael has played a key role in driving forward the the lender’s presence in the UK mortgage market, delivering its mission to make mortgages clearer, fairer and refreshingly “without faff”. Rachael also holds a non-exec role for a social enterprise who provide training, support and food to communities that need it most.

Neil took up the role of Managing Director of the Home Builders Federation (HBF) in January 2020 and was appointed as its Chief Executive in July 2024. Neil is also a non-executive director at Future Homes Hub, an organisation that he and HBF co-founded in October 2021, and that brings together the new homes sector with ways to address climate and environmental challenges. Prior to joining HBF, Neil was Chief Operating Officer of NHBC, the UK’s leading new home warranty provider, where he had held various leadership roles over a 20-year career. Between 2008 and 2016, he was seconded as Chief Executive of the Zero Carbon Hub, providing leadership in the government's vision for zero carbon homes. Neil is a Chartered Builder.

Andrei Lebed is a fintech leader shaping the future of homeownership through technology, AI, and integrated financial services. He is currently Head of Homeownership at Monzo Bank, where he leads the development of end-to-end home buying and ownership journeys - spanning mortgage engagement, broking, conveyancing, and protection insurance. Previously, Andrei was Co-founder and CEO of Koodoo, an FCA-regulated mortgage brokerage and technology platform that pioneered AI-powered mortgage advice and self-service experiences. Under his leadership, Koodoo scaled to power over one million mortgage searches per month through partnerships with major UK brands. He also co-founded Candor, a regulated second charge mortgage lender, where he served as COO and led regulatory approval and operational build-out. He holds a degree from the University of Cambridge

David Marchington is a Principal at Kearney focused on the interface between the financial services and private equity industries. David leads Kearney’s work in the UK residential mortgages and commercial real estate markets, in which he has advised more than 15 market participants, often in the mid-tier and challenger segments.

Phillip is Director for Digital Technology and Innovation at UK Finance.  

He has a particular focus on how legislative and regulatory policy impacts digital transformation in finance and banking. He works across the digital transformation landscape on digital identity, AI, new digital money, tokenisation, open banking and data protection.  

His previous role focussed on influencing payments strategy and regulation in the UK. Phillip has a public policy background with previous roles at HM Treasury and in local government.

He currently sits on the FCA Innovation Advisory Group and Smart Data Council.

Graham McClelland is the CEO of Gen H, a fast-growing, technology-led mortgage lender focused on expanding access to home ownership. 

The Gen H mission is centred on supporting underserved groups into homeownership. Gen H designs products aimed at boosting affordability and providing efficient, responsible lending to those with complex circumstances. Many of Gen H’s customers would not have been able to access homeownership without a Gen H mortgage. 

Graham joined the business to support its funding efforts and has secured a series of unique forward-flow facilities with mission aligned partners.

Eve is Head of Consumer Duty at Fairer Finance. She is a regulatory specialist who supports firms in embedding the Duty. Through her work she has managed large research projects delving into consumer behaviour and perspectives. She also hosts the Fairer Finance podcast. Fairer Finance is a research and ratings agency, consultancy and consumer group. Its mission is to create a fairer financial services market for consumers and the businesses that serve them

Sarah McKenzie is Head of Retail Banking Market Analysis and Policy at the Financial Conduct Authority, where she leads strategy, analysis and policy for retail banking and mortgages, including the Mortgage Rule Review. With over 20 years’ experience across supervision, policy, competition and innovation, Sarah’s work has consistently focused on identifying consumer harm and improving outcomes. She began her career at Lloyds TSB as a graduate trainee before moving into management.

James has over 25 years’ experience in housing and financial services economics and analysis. Joining the Council of Mortgage Lenders in 2003, which merged into UK Finance in 2017, he has continually developed the mortgage industry’s rich data assets, creating a world-leading knowledge base for the sector. Leveraging these assets and his two decades of industry and data knowledge, James has overall responsibility for UK Finance’s mortgage sector analysis and authors many of its publications, including our flagship Household Finance Review.

Prior to settling in financial services James held a range of academic, public and private sector roles in economics, interspersed with sabbaticals to lose himself in various interesting corners of the world. He has now mostly grown up and is married with two mostly grown children and two mostly grown dogs, all of whom believe they are superior economists to him.

Tim leads on Propertymark’s work on welfare reform, local authority enforcement, Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards and the private rented sector. Prior to joining the Propertymark team, Tim amassed over fifteen years’ experience working in policy and research roles including roles with several Welsh local authorities, third sector organisations and more recently was the Campaigns and Public Affairs Officer at the National Residential Landlords Association. Propertymark is the UK’s largest professional membership body for property agents with 19,000 members.

Louisa has a long career in Financial Services, with most of that experience focused on Intermediary Mortgages and a specialism in Buy to Let. Louisa is the Managing Director of Mortgages at Paragon Bank

Naomi leads our European Retail Finance Team and has spent her entire 25+ year career advising and supporting clients within the financial services sector, both in-house and in private practice. She began her career, at the time unusually, qualifying in-house at Cheltenham & Gloucester Building Society, which had just become part of the Lloyds Banking Group, before joining Eversheds Sutherland on qualification. She worked in the Cardiff office for over 10 years before moving back in-house to take responsibility for all retail products at Nationwide Building Society. After leaving Nationwide, Naomi worked as part of Konexo, Eversheds Sutherland’s contracting division, before returning as a London-based Partner in 2018. She has a particular focus on consumer credit, alongside extensive experience in mortgages and wider financial services regulation. In the past 12 months, she has advised many of the clearing banks, challenger banks and building societies on mortgage products and other financial services regulatory issues. She has also led on a number of transactional matters relating to the sale, purchase and financing of mortgage loan portfolios, including equity release, as well as supporting several building societies with their participation in the Bank of England’s Funding for Lending Scheme. Naomi has also supported clients in connection with Section 166 regulatory investigations, helping them prepare for FCA site visits, as well as reviewing and assessing Consumer Duty Board reports. Naomi is ranked in the legal directories Legal 500 and Chambers & Partners for her capabilities in consumer finance and is particularly recognised for her ability to advise on consumer credit and broader regulatory compliance matters.

Sarah is Head of Compliance at MQube and MPowered, an award-winning AI technology company and innovative mortgage lender reimagining loan origination through advanced decisioning, automation and smarter borrower journeys. Her experience spans regulators, industry, trade bodies and fintech. She has worked closely with government, regulators and industry to help shape lending and housing policy. During her time at the FCA, Sarah managed high-profile regulatory projects and supervised some of the UK’s largest retail lenders.