Our Associates
Successful bids and high‑quality project delivery require the right blend of subject expertise and technical skills. HPC carefully curates its teams to ensure we meet these needs. Below are some of the associates of HPC with whom we are currently collaborating on bids or have successfully delivered projects.
Professior Angus Nurse - Subject Expert and Experienced Researcher
Angus Nurse is Professor of Law and Environmental Justice in the School of Economics, Finance and Law at Anglia Ruskin University. He is also a doctoral supervisor at Nottingham Trent University where he was Head of the Criminology and Criminal Justice Department from April 2021 through to July 2023. His research is primarily in critical criminal justice, human rights, access to justice, environmental law, and green criminology and animal law. His books include (1) Reparations Anti-Black Racism (Bristol University Press, 2021), (2) Cleaning Up Greenwash: Corporate Environmental Crime and the Crisis of Capitalism (Lexington Books, 2022), and (3) Policing Wildlife (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015). Prior to becoming an academic Angus worked as an Investigator for the Commission for Local Administration in England (the Local Government Ombudsman) and was previously Investigations Co-ordinator for the RSPB. He has conducted research commissioned by Government Departments (Department of Business and Defra) for regulators (OFCOM) as well as work funded by the European Commission and NGOs including the RSPCA, IFAW and the League Against Cruel Sports. Angus is a member of the Wild Animal Welfare Committee (WAWC) and Chair of the Wildlife Working Group for the UK Centre for Animal Law.
Dr Sarah Watson - Experienced Researcher
Dr Sarah Watson led complex research projects for 10 years at the Solicitors Regulation Authority, including as Head of Research, and previously worked in academic research centres. Drawing on her social science doctorate, she has designed and managed many research and evaluation projects and has translated evidence into credible, actionable policy options that have directly influenced national regulatory policy. Her research has spanned a wide range of topics including education reform, consumer vulnerabilities, behaviours and protection, market risks, technological innovations and evaluating policy changes.
She is also a non-executive director of a local housing association, where she chairs the service performance and customer experience committee and is a member of the governance improvement committee. She therefore brings deep insight into how organisations balance affordability, fairness, real‑world service delivery, public expectations and regulatory obligations.
Dr Fiona Brookman - Subject Expert, Experienced Researcher and Author
Dr Fiona Brookman is a research consultant, Visiting Professor at Cardiff Metropolitan University and Honorary Professor of Criminology at Arizona State University. She holds an MSc and PhD in Criminology from Cardiff University and has almost 30 years' experience researching and publishing on the causes, consequences and prevention of violence.
She is a leading international authority in ethnographic research methods, with extensive experience of interviewing violent offenders, victims/survivors and criminal justice practitioners, observing homicide investigations from crime scene to court in Britain and America, and analysing large datasets including the Home Office Homicide Index.
Fiona has led major research programmes on serious violence, including a Leverhulme-funded project on forensic science in homicide investigation, and evaluations for the Home Office, Ministry of Justice, HMICFRS and Welsh Government covering topics including homicide reduction, gang-related homicide, drug-related violence and police corruption.
Her research has directly impacted policy and practice, contributing to the Violence Reduction Units 2024 Evaluation Report, the Prime Minister's Serious Youth Violence Summit and the Youth Select Committee Inquiry into Knife Crime, and achieving world-leading impact ratings in REF 2014 and 2021.
Fiona has over 80 peer-reviewed publications, is lead editor of the Handbook of Homicide (Wiley, 2017) and author of Understanding Homicide (Sage, 2nd edn, 2022), and serves as expert advisor to the Home Office Crime and Policing Group.
Jemma Macfadyen - Experienced Researcher
Jemma Macfadyen started Spinnaker Consulting in 2008 building on ten years’ experience in a range of senior roles in legal publishing at LexisNexis, Gartner and Thomson Reuters. As an independent researcher and consultant, Jemma has delivered many successful strategic and commercial projects for entities within the legal sector including the SRA, the BSB and The Law Society.
During her career, Jemma has delivered commercial results through strategy development and qualitative research and is experienced at managing complex projects. An experienced qualitative researcher, Jemma excels at understanding the story within the data and in making strategic recommendations based on market evidence to inform regulatory policy and commercial decision-making.
Julie Swan - Subject Expert
Julie Swan has worked in senior positions in regulatory, delivery and quality assurance roles in educational and assessment contexts for over 30 years, most recently at Ofqual, where she was Executive Director of General Qualifications and Deputy Chief Regulator and at the Solicitors Regulation Authority where she was Director of Education and Training.
She has had extensive experience of developing, consulting on and implementing policy at a national level during her career. She was an independent university governor for many years and is currently a governor at a secondary school.
Helen Allingham - Experienced Researcher and Writer
Helen is the co-founder and director of Insightfully Done, a specialist research and business writing provider that works with research firms, consultancies, B2B publishers, and content agencies. A highly experienced research professional, Helen started her career as a retail banking and payments analyst for a research firm, moved into fintech analyst relations at a digital marketing agency, and latterly became head of content for wealth management at GlobalData. Since becoming a freelance consultant in 2018, Helen has delivered several large-scale, mixed-methods research projects as part of a multi-disciplinary team.
Dr Helen Taylor - Subject Expert and Experienced Researcher
Dr Helen Taylor is a Senior Lecturer in Housing at Cardiff Metropolitan University. She has undertaken a number of research projects related to housing and homelessness policy in Wales. Helen led the research team who created the Welsh Government's Empty Properties Handbook for Wales as well completing research for Housing Justice Cymru, CIH Cymru, and the Senedd Research Service.
Associate Professor Jenny Maher - Subject Expert and Experienced Researcher
Dr Jenny Maher is an Associate Professor at the University of South Wales whose research spans environmental crime, animal welfare, interpersonal (e.g. gang and youth) and interspecies violence and victimisation. Over a 20 year career, she has established an international reputation for pioneering research into animal abuse, illegal pet trades, and wildlife crimes, helping shape the field of Green Criminology and advance understanding of how human systems contribute to animal harm. Working across disciplines - including the social sciences, law, environmental science, and the humanities - her work has broadened the evidence base on the intersectional nature of animal abuse and interpersonal violence and crime, and demonstrated the importance of tackling cruelty and environmental crime as interconnected social issues. Jenny has collaborated extensively with international organisations (UNODC, EU, EC), UK and devolved governments, NGOs, and enforcement bodies. Her scholarly work appears in leading journals and Handbooks and she maintains an active programme of policy-oriented writing, including reports for multiple governments and international organisations.
Vicki Summerhayes - Experienced Researcher and Writer
Vicki is the co-founder and director of Insightfully Done, a specialist research and business writing provider that works with research firms, consultancies, B2B publishers, and content agencies. She has over 20 years of research experience, focusing on the financial services, technology and professional services sectors. Having started her career as an insurance analyst for a research firm, Vicki then moved to Accenture, where she led its UK and global insurance research programme. Since becoming a freelance consultant, Vicki has continued to focus on her passion for drawing insights from a range of research techniques, including in-depth qualitative interviews and data analysis.
Mark Eaton - Peer Researcher
Mark Eaton is a homelessness researcher and lived experience advocate currently completing an MA in Social Research Methods at the University of Sheffield.
His work focuses on homelessness policy, Housing First implementation, housing insecurity, and wider homelessness systems across Wales and the UK. Alongside his work with Shelter Cymru,
Mark has contributed to policy discussions, lived experience advisory work, and homelessness research with organisations including Crisis UK.
He recently authored a policy report examining Local Housing Allowance affordability in Wales and is particularly interested in how housing systems and public policy shape experiences of homelessness and support.
Dr Katy Sian, Subject Expert
Dr Katy Sian is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of York. Her research is focused on Critical Race Theory, Racism and Criminalization, Islamophobia and the War on Terror, and Decoloniality. She is currently a co-investigator at the Vulnerability & Policing Futures Research Centre, and leads a project examining young people of colour in Leeds and their experiences of violence and policing. She has established strong partnerships in the area using participatory and community-based approaches. As the Centre's Race Lead, Katy's commitment to embedding anti-racism in research has culminated in the development of her Anti-Racist Research Toolkit, which invites academics and practitioners to reflect upon their methodological and ethical processes to generate research that is driven by social justice.