As National Highways newly appointed Director of Health, Safety and Wellbeing, Mel brings almost 20 years of extensive operational experience to the role. She was one of our first Operations Managers leading traffic officers in the West Midlands and went on to lead all of the company’s national and regional control rooms and, as Operations Director, was accountable for delivering improved safety for all our on-road staff and those of our supply chain. Mel specialises in leading large and complex operations, with diverse teams that are public facing within a 24/7, 365 days a year, safety critical service environment. A longstanding divisional director at National Highways Mel has been responsible for transforming and continually improving safety and customer service delivery across the company.

Mel’s passion is building excellence through diversity and inclusion and she founded National Highways Leading Women Network in 2014. Leading Women won at the Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion Awards 2020, for Best Public Sector Employee Network, paving the way for other employee networks to flourish across the company. Mel also established National Highways Roads for All Forum in 2018, bringing together representative groups and delivering service improvements to better the journey experiences of disabled and vulnerable road users. Mel won the 2021 award for Diversity Champion and the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transportation.