The Board

Our Board is responsible for the governance and strategic direction of LLG. It meets monthly to review the organisations performance against its objectives, approve the strategy, drive forward the campaign agenda, and oversees the finances to ensure that members are provided with an excellent return on their investment through a strong programme of membership engagement opportunities including training, conferences, and networking events. These important discussions help us achieve long term success in shaping the local government legal sector and government policy, and play a major role in ensuring that the needs of our members and their respective local authorities are met.

Chaired by a non-executive director Chair, our 14 Board directors are a diverse mix of member representatives who are leaders in their field, along with a non-executive director with responsibility for equality and diversity, and the Chief Executive who is an executive director. The board strives to be balanced from the perspective of gender and ethnicity, but is also diverse from the perspective of skills, experience, knowledge and thinking styles.

Our Board Members

   
 
Nick Ong-Seng, Chair
  
 

Nick joined the LLG Board as Chair in 2025.  He is an experienced Non-Executive Chairman across professional services, also serving as Chair of the Quality Assurance Scheme Committee at the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries; Chair of the Ethics Committee and Member of the Global Quality and Standards Board at the Moore Global accountancy network; and Vice Chair of the CGMA Examination Board at the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants.

Nick brings extensive Board and Executive leadership experience across risk management, corporate governance, audit and compliance from international financial services as the Board Chairman of a FTSE Group insurer, Risk Committee Chairman and Executive Committee member, having been Group Chief Risk Officer and Managing Director in global banking, member of the Senior Leadership of the Financial Services Authority, and Global Head of Governance, Risk and Assurance at Amazon.

Nick has a proven background in strategy, legal, accounting and professional services from McKinsey, Accenture and DLA Piper, and served on the Boards of the Federation of European Securities Exchanges, Commodity Markets Council and the International Regulatory Strategy Group of TheCityUK.

  

Helen Bradley, President & MO and Governance National Lead Director
Anita Bradley, Vice President & Regional Director - Southern
Nichola Vine, Deputy Vice President & Regional Director – Midlands

Helen has over 20 years local government experience having worked in both district and unitary authorities. Initially specialising in criminal and civil litigation, all of Helen’s roles have included a focus on local authority governance, which reflects her interest in this area of expertise. She is politically astute and has successfully supported senior officers and members to navigate political change within authorities.

Through her work with LLG, Helen is acutely aware of the challenges faced by Monitoring Officers across the sector and the need for strong local authority governance. She works with a number of stakeholders to develop tools to support Monitoring Officers and promote good governance.

Helen believes that a good understanding of local authority governance from the outset was a key factor in her career progression. She is passionate about developing this knowledge with those entering into the local government legal profession and developing the Monitoring Officers of the future.

Helen is the Director of Legal & Democratic Services and Monitoring Officer, Durham County Council.

 

 

 

 

Anita Bradley is the Director of Law and Governance and Monitoring Officer at Oxfordshire County Council, a position she has held since January 2021. With over 36 years of extensive legal experience, Anita has a varied career in both private practices, most recently as a partner in Browne Jacobson LLP and in local government settings.

Anita began her legal career in private practice, specialising in family law and litigation. She transitioned to local government having also worked in the charity sector, in 2001, where she has held various senior roles, including Head of Corporate Administration and Monitoring Officer at Mansfield District Council, Head of Legal Services and Monitoring Officer at Cheshire East Borough Council, and Head of Law and Governance at Oxford City Council. In her current role, Anita is a member of the Council’s Strategic Leadership Team and oversees a wide range of services including legal services, governance and information management. She also serves as the Monitoring Officer.

Anita's has a strong commitment to the local government family and is keen to develop diverse and inclusive networks and opportunities for all local authority lawyers and legal staff at all stages of their careers. In her Board position Anita is undertaking this work in the Southern Region and is keen to talk to all LLG members to understand how we can work together to meet the evolving needs of LLG members.

Nichola is the Strategy and Commissioning Manager, Legal and Democratic at Warwickshire County Council, and  also a Director of Warwickshire Legal Services Trading Limited. Nichola is passionate about developing new talent in the sector as the way forward to ensure a long-term future for lawyers in local government. She believes this can be achieved by providing a space for those motivated towards public service, providing exceptional technical and leadership training and support, together with recognising the importance of wellbeing. Nichola celebrates her 25th anniversary of admittance to the roll this year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                 
 
Paul Turner, Past President
Deborah Evans, CEO
 

 

Paul is the Immediate Past President of LLG. He is the Director of Legal and Assurance and Monitoring Officer at Essex County Council. He has spent the last 30 years working for all types of councils from Northumberland and Greater Manchester to the Eastern region (Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire); from a district with a population of 31,000 to Essex which has a population of 1.5m. He has been a monitoring officer or deputy since 2001. Paul has been a Chairman of the LLG Eastern Branch for three years and previously held the title for Regional Director Position for Eastern. Of his work at Branch level, Paul says “It’s been interesting and fun, and I’ve met so many people who are passionate about making a difference”. 

Deborah Evans was appointed in 2018 as the first Chief Executive of LLG. Having started her career in local government at Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, she has since gone on to work in senior roles across the legal sector, including the in-house legal team of a major retailer; as a Practice Director of a law firm; in management at the Legal Aid Board; Chief Executive of the Legal Complaints Service, and most recently as Chief Executive of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers.

Deborah has also been involved with digital claims resolution platforms such as Claims Portal and MedCo.

 

 

 

 


 
 
Rosemary Keczkes, LLGE Chair & Training Director
Sarah Harriott, National Lead Board Representative
 

 

Principal Legal Officer, Leeds City Council
Rosemary has specialised in civil litigation from the outset of her career and has housing law experience spanning 20 years. She has experience of working in-house for Housing Associations and also Local Government, and is currently the Housing Disrepair Team Leader at Leeds City Council and a Law Society Housing Law Committee member and current Chair. Rosemary is also a member of the SHLA, a member of the Law Society Education and Training Committee and also Board Member for Chartford Housing Board (which is part of Horton Housing, a small Housing Association in Bradford).

 

 

 

Sarah has worked as a Lawyer in Local Government for over 10 years and has a background in Civil Litigation.  Most of her time has been spent at Coventry City Council where she specialised in Information Management and Corporate Governance.  She is the Board Representative for Information Management.  Sarah is now looking forward to expanding her expertise at West Northamptonshire Council where she will be specialising in Contract Law.

Sarah is passionate about encouraging Aspiring Lawyers to consider careers in Local Government Law and has built a presence on Social Media to promote the work of Local Government Lawyers.  She also completed the Local Government Diploma in 2023.  Sarah was awarded the Birmingham Black Lawyers Lawyer of the Year Award in July 2023 in recognition of her efforts.

 
   
 
John Purvis, Regional Director - Northern
Samuel Pitchford, Regional Director – Wales 
  

 

John is currently the Legal Manager at Leeds City Council.  Previously John was an Assistant Solicitor at Leeds City Council, specialising in Procurement and Commercial Contracts. After a short spell in private practice, he started his local government legal career in 2013 as a Legal Apprentice, before moving between various local authorities and gaining experience in a wide variety of areas, and eventually qualifying in June 2021. 

Outside of the Council, John is an active member of the Leeds Junior Lawyers Division and a member of the Procurement Lawyers Association.

 

 

Samuel is a solicitor at Bridgend County Borough Council, where he handles deprivation of liberty cases in the Court of Protection and regulatory prosecutions. He previously worked at Pembrokeshire County Council on its successful bid for the Celtic Freeport, for which he won LLG Junior Lawyer of the Year in 2024. 

  

He worked briefly at the UK Electoral Commission, advising on electoral reform, devolution, political party finance, and procurement. Prior to that he trained in private practice, including working on the Grenfell Tower Inquiry, and he assisted in the establishment of the not-for-profit Hongkongers in Britain. 

 

 

 

 

 

 
     
 
Emma Duncan, Regional Director - Eastern
Patricia Narebor, Regional Director – London
 

 

Emma has spent all of her legal career in local government, working across districts, unitaries and now at Cambridgeshire County Council. She has a keen interest in how good governance contributes to well-functioning Councils.

 

 

 

 

 

Patricia was the Monitoring Officer and Deputy Director of Legal and Democratic Services at the London Borough of Bexley, Monitoring Officer for Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells District Councils and responsibility for Mid Kent Legal Partnership, to include Swale District Council; as well as previous employment at three other London Boroughs.

Patricia is particularly interested in engaging with lawyers and legal officers at all levels,  ensuring development and mentoring opportunities, collaboration between authorities and addressing staff recruitment and retention within the sector.