The Case for Private Markets
Across Pensions

Rachel Brougham has worked in the pensions industry for more than 30 years. She joined BESTrustees in 2014 and currently works with a number of clients, covering both defined benefit and defined contribution schemes.

Since joining BESTrustees, Rachel’s appointments have included two master trust boards and two Independent Governance Committees of major UK pension providers, and the chairmanship of a number of defined benefit schemes. Her experience includes the development of the trustee boards, their structures and processes, including committees and appropriate reporting, and the development of robust risk management frameworks.

Rachel is used to working with and managing a number of advisers on any one scheme, expecting a collaborative and respectful working relationship between them. She is also used to working with in-house teams, ensuring that the trustee board receives the support it needs in carrying out its duties. Working with the schemes’ advisers, she has implemented TPR’s integrated risk management (IRM) approach to funding, investment and covenant work in her DB schemes to good effect, and is used to working with an overseas parent.

Rachel spent most of her career at Mercer providing actuarial, benefit, governance and DC consulting advice to clients. She remains an Associate Member of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.

Trevor is a Managing Director in bfinance’s private markets team, responsible for the research and manager selection functions across private debt, including Corporate Direct Lending, Real Estate debt and other niche or opportunistic strategies.

Before joining bfinance, Trevor was Deputy CIO and the Credit Strategy Investment Director at the UK LGPS pooling entity LPPI, having previously been Deputy CIO at Lancashire County Pension Fund (LCPF).  As a pension fund investor, he had broad responsibility for alternative asset allocations which covered all private market strategies.

Whilst at LCPF, Trevor oversaw significant changes in portfolio strategy which included the creation of a ground-breaking £1.5bn allocation to alternative credit and was recognised by numerous industry awards including the Institutional Investor European peer-to-peer award for ‘Best use of Private Markets’.  PDI magazine named him as one of the 30 global most influential investors in private debt and his opinions continue to be widely referenced in industry media.

Prior to moving into pension fund investment, Trevor was Managing Director and Head of Financial Products at RBS.  He is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and holds an MA from Cambridge University.  In addition to his work for bfinance, he acts as independent advisor to South Yorkshire Pensions Authority.

Edward joined Alpha Real Capital in April 2021 as Chief Investment Officer and Head of Sustainability. In this role, he chairs the Investment Committee, oversees the investment process and fund performance, and leads ESG integration across the group.

Edward has over 25 years’ financial services and investment management experience covering investment management, insurance and investment banking. Prior to joining Alpha Real Capital he spent 14 years at MetLife where he was Chief Investment Officer, EMEA, overseeing approximately £10 billion equivalent of AUM across public and private credit, infrastructure, and real estate. Prior to becoming CIO, he was Managing Director and Head of Credit having previously undertaken roles in portfolio management and credit research. Earlier in his career, Ed spent two years as a Senior Analyst at Moody’s Investors Service, having started his career at Barclays Investment Bank where he worked in IBD and debt advisory.

Edward holds a B.A. in European Studies from the University of Manchester.

Padmesh Shukla is the Chief Investment Officer of Transport for London’s £14 billion Pension Fund, where he has delivered major changes from diversifying the Fund’s bond and equities portfolio to building its over £5 billion alternatives programme, with non-UK assets making up close to 80% of the Fund. He has also lead the Fund’s sustainability and engagement strategy, which lead to the Fund announcing a very ambitious Net Zero and “ESG tilted” investment targets late last year.

Emerging markets and climate change are of particular interest to him, having previously worked at the World Bank and the Centre for International Development. He went to Harvard University on full scholarship for his Masters in International Economics and Development (major in Finance) and has a Bachelors in Civil Engineering. He sits on the UK CFA Asset Owner Council and several boards and is involved in multiple research and policy initiatives.

Bola joined Enfield as a Finance Manager (Pension & Treasury) overseeing and directing the management of the council’s pension investment strategy of £1.5bn assets and treasury strategy of some £50m of investment portfolio and over £900m of borrowing portfolio. 

Previously Bola was responsible for directing and overseeing the management of £1.7bn assets of Tower Hamlets Pension Fund. Prior to joining Tower Hamlets, she worked in a similar role for over 7 years with London Borough of Lewisham Pension Fund before moving on in 2007 to oversee a private corporate pension fund, Trafalgar House Pension Trust with over 40 fund managers with investments in different asset class such as hedge funds, liability matching investments, swaps, CLOs, infrastructure, property, private equity, etc. for almost 3 years. 

Bola has gained first-hand experience on a wide range of activities, such as creating and enhancing external relationships with key stakeholders, project management, procurement, performance measurements & monitoring, cash flow management, funding gap management, investment portfolio restructuring, managers’ selection, asset allocation, managing the valuation of swaps legs and collateral managements. 

Bola is a frequent participant on the local government conference circuit, she is currently the chair of London Treasury Officers Forum (LTOF). Bola holds a degree in chemical engineering and an associate member of chartered institute of management accountant (ACMA CGMA). 

Paul is the Head of Investments for the £8bn British Steel Pension Scheme and oversees strategy and day to day management of their outsourced investment arrangements.

Prior to that, he was responsible for pension asset management globally for Japan Tobacco International based in Switzerland. Paul has also worked as a fund of hedge funds manager and in his early career was an investment consultant at Bacon & Woodrow (now part of AON) and Mercer.

Paul has professional experience of building a private markets investment program from scratch and also managing an exit from private investments.

Paul is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries, holds the CFA certificate in ESG investing and has a degree in Physics from Cambridge University.