Born and schooled in the beautiful valleys of South Wales, and completing higher education in England, Dawn joined the John Lewis Partnership as a graduate. After 14 years with JLP, moving to the public sector and in 2004 joining Northamptonshire Fire and Rescue Service as a senior manager with a background in business and performance management.

Dawn completed her Masters in Business Administration in 2011 and subsequently her full operational command training. In April 2015, she began a secondment to central Government as a professional adviser to the Minister for Fire and Rescue, in both DCLG and the Home Office. In June 2016 Dawn was appointed the Deputy Chief Fire Officer in East Sussex and Chief Fire Officer in October 2017.

A member of the Chief Fire Officers Association (CFOA) (now known as the National Fire Chief’s Council (NFCC)), Dawn has led the development of the associations approach to drowning prevention and water safety since 2013 for all UK based Fire Services, she also represents NFCC on the National Water Safety Forum and was actively involved in the development of the UK National Drowning Prevention Strategy, launched at Westminster in February 2016.

An active volunteer for over 35 years, Dawn was a Trustee and Chair of the Board of a Northamptonshire voluntary infrastructure organisation prior to joining RLSS UK as a Trustee and Chair of Board between July 2016-December 2018.

Her passion, both through her professional and voluntary work is community safety, helping to educate and ensure the public understand risk and stay safe.

Dawn was a recipient of the Kings Fire Service Medal in the recent New Year’s Honour’s for her National work on Water Safety.

With a background as a software engineer Jennifer started out writing code for submarines, but quickly found a love of all things data. Over the past 10 years Jennifer has moved from building large scale GIS systems to researching geospatial linked data, leading the development of new data products at Ordnance Survey, delivered innovative new data and analytics solutions in the Utilities industry, and now drives data adoption and strategy at The Maritime and Coastguard Agency.

Clare has held the role of Deputy Director for Water and Flood at the Welsh Government since September 2022. Clare has a proven track record of policy and programme delivery having spent 15 years working across Whitehall departments on complex multi-faceted issues including immigration and trade. Her current team leads on a breadth of environmental areas including improving water quality and flood management. Clare has an environmental science academic background.

Jonathon is an Australian public health injury prevention specialist educated at the University of Western Australia and Curtin University of Technology
 
Jonathon has worked for the World Health Organization for 19 years in a range of country and regional postings including China, Viet Nam, Philippines, the Western Pacific and European Regions, all in injury prevention, with a priority focus on prevention of all forms of drowning.
 
Jonathon has contributed to the development and implementation of all WHO’s normative and advocacy resource for drowning prevention and has a long history of collaboration with international drowning prevention partners including the Royal National Lifeboat Institution and the International Lifesaving Society.

Rachel has had a long-term interest in the marine environment, having several years’ experience working across both the public and private sectors. She has worked on a variety of global projects, that consider the impacts of climate change on our oceans. Rachel has developed numerous models; to simulate wave process including refraction and diffraction, and calculate wave overtopping of sea defences. Using various models, she has analysed how the tide and wave overtopping influences the extent of flooding throughout coastal communities. She has worked with a wide range of clients including government bodies, developers, insurers and reinsurers. Rachel is currently a Marine Scientist with the Met Office, researching how changing sea levels and storm surges effect coastal risk. She is passionate about protecting our coasts through both her work and communicating climate change to a wider audience.

Claire has been communicating water safety messages since 2015 through her role as campaigns manager at the Canal & River Trust and has developed a real passion for water safety. Claire recently launched a new Toddler Water Safety Week in February ’23, toddler safety being something she’s become all too aware of being the mum of a three-year-old. She is now Campaigns and Programme Manager (Public Safety) at the Trust and took over as chair of the NWSF comms group in January 2023.

Tommy works within Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service’s Education and Engagement Department, where he is the lead for Open Water Safety.
 
He is a serving Firefighter and Swift Water Rescue Technician within Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service with 18 years of service, in addition to having been an active Water Safety Advocate for many Years.
 
In the 2018 New Year’s Honours, Tommy received his Queens Fire Service Medal for his passion and dedication in raising awareness of the dangers in and around open water throughout the UK.
 
Tommy collaborates with many organisations across the UK, including RoSPA, RNLI, RLSS and NFCC in their aims to deliver Life Saving Water Safety Awareness, and reducing the number of incidents and fatalities that occur in and around open water.

Nick works for the RNLI in the North and East of England, looking at all things Water Safety and Drowning Prevention. This includes supporting their volunteers at stations, staff members, and their seasonal beach lifeguards to help spread their Water Safety initiatives and messages to a wide audience.
 
Nick is a keen water enthusiast, often found in the sea in Suffolk, on the Boards inland water ways, or exploring new places abroad. In his spare time he coaches Surf lifesaving sport for his local lifesaving club Waveney SLSC, and lifeguard on the beach for the RNLI in the summer months.

Volunteers, supports, members and employees at RLSS UK are all working together to achieve a core purpose – to prevent drowning. RLSS UK are determined and committed to delivering a year-on-year reduction in the number of people losing their lives through drowning. Lee Heard, Charity Director at RLSS UK, has a strong background in community development initiatives and volunteering work, with a real passion for empowering people to make positive change in their communities. In recognising the Charity has a wealth of people with valuable skills, Lee works to ensure an honest and open culture, encouraging personal development for the benefit of everybody. Through adequate and timely support for people who represent the organisation – Lee’s team equips their members and supporters with the right tools, so the charity can proactively promote RLSS UK messages, training and education, nationwide. Lee, over the past 5 years, has led the charity to be targeted in their approach so that the charities resources can be distributed to create efficient, sustainable, and impactful interventions. This includes the development of new and exciting lifesaving pathways, awards and campaigns. Over the next business plan cycle, Lee and his team are focussing their attention on growing RLSS UKs brand and it’s diversity of supporters.

Working in Drowning Prevention, the RNLI Water Safety team works with dedicated RNLI volunteers and partners to reduce drowning. Our Water Safety volunteers engage with thousands of individuals across Scotland, providing key water safety advice. In 2022 we reached an estimated 11,805 children and young people across Scotland with consistent and clear lifesaving advice, delivering engaging workshops to develop understanding of dangers associated with water, and how to keep themselves and others safe. Furthermore, volunteers spoke to an additional 14,943 adults on a variety of water safety related issues, such as lifejacket clinics, activity-specific advice and emergency guidance. In July 2022 we marked World Drowning Prevention Day alongside partners such as the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, RoSPA, Scottish Water and Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Rangers: this is indicative of a collaborative determination to reduce drowning.

The objectives of the Water Safety Scotland Education Subgroup are a reflection of this determination. The Education Subgroup works to contribute to the targets set out in Scotland’s Drowning Prevention Strategy (SDPS), which seeks to reduce accidental drowning deaths in Scotland by 50% by 2026 and reduce risk amongst the highest risk populations, groups and communities. The Education Subgroup acknowledges the influence and power that the education sector has in fostering safe behaviours in relation to water, therefore we are committed to supporting communities and schools with resource and guidance that will drive a generational change in water safety. The subgroup has created a suite of age and stage appropriate resources for the Curriculum for Excellence (Scottish Curriculum), supported by the Scottish Government. This is an important step in ensuring children and young people receive opportunities to develop understanding of water-related risk and crucial water safety messaging.

Hanna has worked for Swim Wales since 2009 firstly as Tutor delivering education courses as part of the Free Swimming Upskilling Project and before moving into the role of South East Wales Regional Manager; supporting Local Authorities, private providers and aquatic clubs in the region as well as being instrumental to national projects and developments. Now National Learn to Swim Manager, Hanna’s role is to focus specifically on her area of expertise - Learn to Swim, School Swimming and Water Safety and she is passionate about encouraging providers to provide a high quality, safe and fun environment for children to learn the vital life skills of water competence.

Hanna has been involved in aquatics in various capacities from a young age. A multiple British National butterfly finalist, moving on to being a National League Water Polo player, Open Water swimmer and more recently triathlete, volunteer, club committee member, official, teacher, coach, team manager, Development Officer, Tutor and Internal Verifier. Hanna has experience of most roles within the aquatic environment!

James Sullivan is a Watch Commander in the Scottish Fire & Rescue Service’s National Water Safety Group. He joined the Fire Service in 2008 and in addition to firefighting roles has been a member of the Swift Water Rescue Teams in both Perth and Glasgow. He currently works to support Water Safety Scotland and has a direct role in delivering the aims of Scotland’s Drowning Prevention Strategy. James wrote and implemented the Partnership Approach to Water Safety (PAWS) framework and co-wrote the Drowning & Incident Review (DIR) with Carlene McAvoy of RoSPA, on behalf of Water Safety Scotland.

Carlene McAvoy is RoSPA’s Leisure Safety Manager who is currently working on the promotion and delivery of RoSPA’s water and leisure safety programme for the UK. Carlene is the founder and secretariat to Water Safety Scotland, and co-author of Scotland’s Drowning Prevention Strategy. Carlene also co-created the Drowning and Incident Review (DIR) with SFRS, and recently published research into DIR in BMJ Injury Prevention.

Martin Barwood is a Professor of Applied Environmental Physiology at Leeds Trinity University, North Yorkshire. His research group focusses on developing an evidence base to inform drowning prevention interventions including recommending changes to drowning prevention policy and strategy. His recent work has audited the fatal incident data from the UK’s Water Incident Database (WAID) in meeting key steps of the World Health organization’s 2017 drowning prevention implementation guide. The work has recognized WAID as a rigorous and transparent database for documenting fatal drowning events but also provides onward recommendations to enhance the secondary data quality to inform research and prevention of future UK drowning events; an enhanced version of WAID was launched in 2023.

More recently Martin’s research group has focused on the use of secondary data combined with geospatial statistical and mapping techniques to study the nuanced nature of drowning with a view to targeting prevention efforts toward specific high-priority areas. His group has also undertaken work to consider key differences between drowning events in-land compared to coastal locations and in unintentional compared to intentional drownings. His presentation will share these recent learnings with a view to supporting drowning prevention efforts nationally and internationally.

Martin is a member of the International Drowning Researchers’ Alliance (IDRA) and is honoured to be the public health representative on the UK’s National Water Safety Forum.

With a background as a software engineer Jennifer started out writing code for submarines, but quickly found a love of all things data. Over the past 10 years Jennifer has moved from building large scale GIS systems to researching geospatial linked data, leading the development of new data products at Ordnance Survey, delivered innovative new data and analytics solutions in the Utilities industry, and now drives data adoption and strategy at The Maritime and Coastguard Agency.