Dr Julia Baker

Head of nature services, Mott MacDonald

Baker is head of nature services at Mott MacDonald. She has designed and delivered biodiversity net gain on a variety of infrastructure projects, including transport, housing and energy. She is the lead author of the UK’s Good Practice Principles on BNG and runs professional training courses on BNG. Baker is also chair of the British standard working group on biodiversity, and a visiting researcher at the University of Oxford.

Alexis Perry

Commercial director, Environment Bank

Sixteen years of acquiring land and obtaining planning permissions with leading national housebuilders have provided Perry with a wealth of experience spanning financial, legal and planning disciplines. As a qualified chartered surveyor, Perry ensures Environment Bank delivers habitat banks in the best places around the UK alongside providing an efficient supply of BNG Units.

Nina Pindham

Barrister, No5 Barristers Chambers

Pindham is a specialist planning and environmental law practitioner. She has appeared in a number of leading strategic environmental law claims, including Friends of the Earth’s claims regarding the failure to carry out an assessment of the environmental impacts of the National Planning Policy Framework and whether the GHG emissions of an oil and gas mine are indirect effects of that development for the purposes of an environmental impact assessment (now before the Supreme Court). She was instructed in the successful challenge to the government’s net zero strategy and in a successful challenge before the United Nations regarding the UK government’s failure to comply with international environmental law, subsequent to which she was instructed by the UK government to appear before the United Nations (Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee). She advises developers, local authorities and major infrastructure providers on a range of planning and environmental matters, including residential development, hazardous substances consent, waste, EIA, SEA, agriculture, water, air quality, CPO, enforcement, and nature conservation issues. Pindham is ranked as a Tier 1 barrister in the Legal 500 and a leading junior in Chambers and Partners. She serves as vice-chair of the Board of the United Kingdom Environmental Law Association and is a committee member of the Planning and Environmental Bar Association.

Emma Toovey

Ecology director, Environment Bank

Toovey has more than 18 years of ecological consultancy experience across diverse industries, specifically the development sector, working with landowners, developers, planning authorities and a range of stakeholders in the development consenting process. She ensures sound ecological principles and technical integrity underpin every decision the business makes.