Officers and Founders
Toby Young
Founder and Director
Toby Young is a British journalist and former Director of the New Schools Network, a free schools charity. In addition to being the founder and General Secretary of the Free Speech Union, he is an associate editor of the Spectator and the editor-in-chief of the Daily Sceptic.
Prof Nigel Biggar
Chair
Nigel Biggar is the Regius Professor Emeritus of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford. He is the author of several books, including Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning.
Douglas Murray
Director
Douglas Murray is an author and journalist based in Britain. In addition to being an associate editor of the Spectator, he is the author of several books, including, most recently, The War on the West.
Luke Johnson
Director
Luke Johnson is a director of Gail’s Bakeries, Brompton Bicycles and chairman of the Brighton Pier Group. He is chairman of The Almeida Theatre and former chairman of Channel 4 Television, the RSA and the Institute of Cancer Research.
Former Directors, Founders, etc.
Inaya Folarin Iman
Founding Director 2020-21
Inaya Folarin Iman is a freelance journalist and former project manager at Index on Censorship. She uses her work to advocate for democracy and individual liberty.
Dr Radomir Tylecote
Co-Founder, Founding Director 2020-21
Dr Radomir Tylecote is the Director of Research at the Legatum Institute. Radomir was formerly a member of the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT), where he was an external advisor to HM Treasury.
Ian Rons
Co-Founder, Honorary President
Company Staff
Toby Young
Sigrun Olafsdottir
Tracy-Jane Afriyie
Charles Daniel
Dr Bryn Harris
Thomas Harris
Fraser Hudghton
Dr Benjamin Jones
Tim Cruddas
Dr Jan Macvarish
Karolien Celie
Carrie Clark
Esther Hartley
Kate Howell
Samuel Armstrong
Dr Frederick Attenborough
Legal Advisory Council
Rebecca Butler
Legal Advisory Council
Rebecca Butler is a barrister at Kings Bench Chambers. She is also trained as a mediator. She has a large social media following and often appears on televison.
Paul Cavin KC
Legal Advisory Council
Paul Cavin KC specialises in fraud and corporate crime – particularly bribery and corruption but also money laundering, cyber crime, and proceeds of crime. He is regularly instructed by the CPS and the SFO and was on the Attorney General’s Criminal List for many years.
Geoffrey Davies
Legal Advisory Council
Geoffrey Davies, a partner in Keystone Law and has nearly 50 years’ experience as a corporate lawyer in the City of London.
Paul Diamond
Legal Advisory Council
Paul Diamond is a barrister who practices in the field of European law and is an expert on the law of religious liberty. He has acted in a number of controversial cases; including cases on free speech and Internet freedom.
Robert Dougans
Legal Advisory Council
Educated at Oriel College, Oxford, and an experienced litigation solicitor and High Court advocate, Robert now spends most of his time dealing with cross-border litigation but is always keen on the defence of free speech, having represented journalists, bloggers and newspapers in fending off people trying to shut them down.
Christopher Gelber
Legal Advisory Council
Christopher Gelber has over 25 years’ experience as a constitutional and commercial lawyer. He has degrees in Philosophy and Law from Cambridge and Sydney universities, and is passionate about free speech.
Dr Larry George
Larry George is dual qualified as a solicitor and barrister (non-practising) and is accredited as a Mediator. He has over 40 years’ experience principally in the areas of non-contentious corporate and commercial law but has significant dispute resolution, reputation management and litigation management experience. His academic research focussed on the use of media in group litigation and included the legal tensions between freedom of expression and other guaranteed rights, freedoms and protections.
Luke Gittos
Legal Advisory Council
Luke Gittos is a columnist for Spiked and a consultant solicitor at Murrays Partnership.
Prof Steven Greer
Legal Advisory Council
Steven Greer is Emeritus Professor of Human Rights at the University of Bristol Law School, Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and Visiting Research Fellow at the Oxford Institute for British Islam. He studied Law at the University of Oxford, Sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and has a PhD in Law from the Queen’s University of Belfast. In a career spanning nearly 40 years he has taught and delivered numerous papers throughout the UK and abroad, including in China and at Harvard Law School. He has published widely, particularly in the fields of criminal justice, human rights, and law and terrorism. Two of his books were shortlisted for prestigious prizes. He has also acted as consultant/advisor to various organizations, written for The Guardian, The Times, The Irish Times, and The Belfast Telegraph, and appeared on numerous radio and TV stations, including in Pakistan.
Gareth Hughes
Gareth is a barrister and Partner at Keystone Law and has practised in the field of public law for 30 years and more particularly in planning law and licensing and gambling law for which he is recognised in both Legal 500 and Chambers as one of the top ten leading practitioners in London. He has also been an elected councillor and was a parliamentary candidate in the 2010 General Election.
John Jolliffe
Legal Advisory Council
John Jolliffe is a barrister who practises across public and regulatory law. He has acted in dozens of cases before the High Court and the Court of Appeal.
Spencer Keen
Legal Advisory Council
Spencer Keen is an advocate with a broad practice. His main specialisms are employment, commercial law and European law. He appears regularly in the High Court, Employment Tribunal and appellate courts and tribunals.
Jaan Larner
Jaan Larner is a corporate partner at Keystone Law with over 20 years professional experience.
Graham Lodge
Legal Advisory Council
After some years in banking and commerce, Graham Lodge was called to the Bar in 1971 and practised until 2007 in civil, family, employment and criminal law. He set up a trade union called the Bar Union, since discontinued.
Lord Macdonald of River Glaven Kt KC
Legal Advisory Council
One of the UK’s leading criminal, international and regulatory lawyers, Ken Macdonald KC was called to the Bar in 1978 and elected Chairman of the Criminal Bar Association in 2003. A founder member of Matrix Chambers, he served as Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales between 2003-2008. In 2007, he was knighted for services to the law, and in 2010 he was appointed to the House of Lords, where he sits as a crossbencher. He is a former Visiting Professor of Law at the London School of Economics and was Warden of Wadham College Oxford from 2012-2021. He is presently Chair of the Orwell Foundation, which awards the UK’s premier prizes for journalism and political writing, and President of the Howard League for Penal Reform. In his spare time, Ken Macdonald presents Double Jeopardy, a law and politics podcast.
James Montgomery
Legal Advisory Council
James Montgomery has 30 years experience in the courtroom defending individual rights. He is a member of the New York State Bar and also the English Bar.
Dr Wanjiru Njoya
Legal Advisory Council
Dr Wanjiru Njoya is a former Rhodes Scholar (St Edmunds College Cambridge and Kenya, 1998). She teaches law at the University of Exeter. She is the author of Economic Freedom and Social Justice: The Classical Ideal of Equality in Contexts of Racial Diversity, a book which argues that equality law must have regard to individual liberty, fundamental human freedoms and the broader welfare of society.
Peter Smith
Legal Advisory Council
Peter Smith is a barrister based in Dubai with experience of media litigation including defamation, malicious falsehood, the misuse of private information and data protection litigation.
Prof Andrew Tettenborn
Legal Advisory Council
Andrew Tettenborn is Professor of Commercial Law at Swansea University (previously Cambridge and Exeter), who also teaches and lectures in Europe and the Far East. A member of the Heterodox Academy, he writes from time to time for Spiked, the Catholic Herald and other publications on freedom of speech issues.
Prof Raymond Wacks
Legal Advisory Council
Raymond Wacks, Emeritus Professor of Law and Legal Theory, is a leading authority on privacy and media freedom. He has published numerous books on this and other legal subjects which have been translated into a dozen languages.
Patrick Way KC
Legal Advisory Council
Patrick Way KC qualified as a solicitor and was a partner in two London law firms before being called to the Bar and then taking silk. He has advised and represented a wide range of clients at all levels of the English legal system. He is passionate about the need to protect and enforce freedom of speech particularly as this fundamental right seems currently to be under threat.
Paul Yowell
Legal Advisory Council
Paul Yowell is the Benn Fellow and Tutor in Law at Oriel College and Associate Professor of Law at the University of Oxford. He is the author of Constitutional Rights and Constitutional Design: Moral and Empirical Reasoning in Judicial Review and co-author of Legislated Rights: Securing Human Rights Through Legislation.
Advisory Council
Dr John Armstrong
Advisory Council
John Armstrong is a Reader in Financial Mathematics at King’s College London. His current research interests are applications of geometry to stochastic processes and mathematical finance and collective pension schemes.
Prof Timothy Bates
Timothy Bates is Professor of Individual Differences in Psychology at Edinburgh University.
Dr Jaspreet Singh Boparai
Advisory Council
Jaspreet Singh Boparai is a classicist and art historian, and a contributor to Quillette.
Nick Dixon
Nick Dixon is a comedian and writer. He has appeared on Comedy Central and written articles for publications such as Spiked and Free Market Conservatives.
Dr Andrew Doyle
Advisory Council
Andrew Doyle holds degrees in English and a doctorate in Early Renaissance Poetry from Wadham College, Oxford. He is a Visiting Research Fellow at Queen’s University, Belfast, and the creator of Titania McGrath.
Nic Elliott
Advisory Council
Nic is the CTO of Evolving Networks, a technologist and consultant with experience delivering IT solutions across the private and public sectors. He is also co-host of the Sounding Board podcast on free speech, free markets and free trade.
Simon Evans
Advisory Council
Simon Evans has been a stand up comedian for 25 years. He is a regular on Radio Four’s The News Quiz and has written and presented five series of his own Radio Four show, Simon Evans Goes to Market.
Francis Foster
Advisory Council
Francis Foster is a comedian and teacher. He is the co-presenter of the popular YouTube channel Triggernometry.
Claire Fox, Baroness Fox of Buckley
Advisory Council
Claire Fox is a broadcaster and writer. She is the Director of the Academy of Ideas, a board member of the international debate network Time To Talk, and a convenor of the Battle of Ideas festival.
Dominic Frisby
Advisory Council
Dominic is a financial writer and a comedian. His writes a weekly investment column for MoneyWeek and his most recent book is Daylight Robbery: How Tax Shaped Our Past and Will Change Our Future (2020). As a comedian he is perhaps best known for the song 17 Million F*ck-Offs.
Mark Gallagher
Advisory Council
Mark Gallagher founded Pagefield Communications. He specialises in campaigning, PR, public and regulatory affairs, and issues and crisis management.
David Goodhart
Advisory Council
David Goodhart is a British journalist, commentator, and author. He is the founder and former Editor of Prospect magazine.
Prof Matthew Goodwin
Advisory Council
Matthew Goodwin is a British academic who is currently Professor of Politics in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Kent, and Associate Fellow at Chatham House.
Dr David Green
Advisory Council
David G. Green is an author and the Founder and Director of Civitas. His most recent book is entitled The Demise of the Free State: Why democracy and the EU don’t mix.
Prof James Hankins
Advisory Council
James Hankins is a professor in the History Department of Harvard University, the General Editor of The I Tatti Renaissance Library and the Associate Editor of the Catalogus Translationum et Commentariorum.
Julia Hartley-Brewer
Advisory Council
Julia Hartley-Brewer is the breakfast show presenter on talkRADIO. A former political editor of the Sunday Express, she has worked at LBC, the Guardian and the London Evening Standard, as well as being a regular guest on BBC Question Time and Sky News. She has been an outspoken defender of freedom of speech for many years.
Prof Dennis Hayes
Advisory Council
Dennis Hayes is Professor of Education at the University of Derby and the Director of the campaign group Academics For Academic Freedom. His latest book is entitled The Death of Academic Freedom: Free speech and censorship on campus.
Inaya Folarin Iman
Advisory Council
Inaya Folarin Iman is a freelance journalist and former project manager at Index on Censorship. She uses her work to advocate for democracy and individual liberty.
Prof Jeremy Jennings
Advisory Council
Jeremy Jennings is an English political theorist and Professor of Political Theory at King’s College London. He is predominantly interested in the history of political thought, and is the founding editor of The European Journal of Political Theory.
Dr Helen Joyce
Advisory Council
Dr Helen Joyce is the author of the best-selling book Trans, named by the Spectator as one of the best books of the year in 2021. Until 2022 she was the Britain editor of the Economist. She has a PhD in mathematics from University College London.
Prof Lee Jussim
Advisory Council
Lee Jussim is an American social psychologist, researching the fields of person perception, stereotype accuracy and bias. He also helped found the Heterodox Academy.
Prof Eric Kaufmann
Advisory Council
Eric Kaufmann is a Professor of Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London. He is a specialist on Orangeism in Northern Ireland, nationalism, political demography and demography of the religious/irreligious.
Konstantin Kisin
Advisory Council
Konstantin Kisin is a Russian-British comedian, podcaster, writer and social commentator. He is the co-presenter of the popular YouTube channel Triggernometry.
Claire Lehmann
Advisory Council
Claire Lehman is an Australian journalist and the founding editor of Quillette. She holds a degree in psychology and English from the University of Adelaide.
Mark Littlewood
Advisory Council
Mark Littlewood is the Director General of the libertarian free-market think tank The Institute of Economic Affairs. He has formerly been the Chief Press Spokesman for the Liberal Democrats and the Pro-Euro Conservative Party and was an advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron.
Sumantra Maitra
Advisory Council
Dr. Sumantra Maitra is a Non-Resident Fellow at the James G Martin Center and an Early Career Member at the Royal Historical Society. He is also a Senior Contributor to The Federalist and a columnist for The National Interest.
Jon Moynihan
Advisory Council
Jon Moynihan OBE is a British businessman who served as the CEO and Executive Chairman of PA Consulting Group.
Dr James Orr
Advisory Council
Dr James Orr is a University Lecturer in Philosophy of Religion at the University of Cambridge. He entered academia after a legal career in corporate finance.
Dr Pamela Paresky
Allison Pearson
Advisory Council
Born in South Wales and educated at Cambridge University, Allison Pearson is an award-winning journalist and an international bestselling novelist. Her books have been translated into 32 languages. Allison is a columnist for the Daily Telegraph and writes for many other publications, both in the UK and the US.
Prof Robert Plomin
Advisory Council
Robert Plomin is an American psychologist and geneticist at King’s College London best known for his work in twin studies and behaviour genetics.
Prof Michael Rainsborough
Advisory Council
Michael Rainsborough is Professor of Strategic Theory at King’s College London. He is a former Head of the Department of War Studies. He is a specialist in the ideas of dissent and resistance. Among his numerous writings he is co-author of Sacred Violence: Political Religion in a Secular Age (with David Martin Jones).
Matt Ridley
Advisory Council
Matt Ridley is an author, a journalist and a Conservative Peer. His books have won several awards and sold over a million copies worldwide, the latest of which is How Innovation Works.
Andrew Roberts
Advisory Council
Andrew Roberts is a Visiting Professor at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, a Roger and Martha Mertz Visiting Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and a Lehrman Institute Distinguished Lecturer at the New York Historical Society.
Prof Abhishek Saha
Abhishek Saha is a Professor of Mathematics at Queen Mary University of London who is known for his research contributions in number theory. He also has a long-standing interest in individual liberty, free speech and academic freedom.
Juliet Samuel
Advisory Council
Juliet Samuel is a columnist at The Telegraph. She previously covered finance and business at The Times, The Wall Street Journal and City A.M.
Benjamin Schwarz
Advisory Council
Benjamin Schwarz is an American journalist and author. He is the former national and literary editor of The Atlantic magazine.
Andy Shaw
Advisory Council
Andy Shaw is the co-founder (with Andrew Doyle) of London’s free-thinking comedy club, Comedy Unleashed. The club hosts comedians who challenge conventional thinking and make us think as well as laugh.
Lionel Shriver
Advisory Council
An American writer of longstanding residence in Britain, Lionel Shriver is the author of thirteen novels and one collection of short fiction. She’s a widely published journalist, currently with a fortnightly column in the Spectator.
Dr Michael Shermer
Advisory Council
Dr Michael Shermer is the Publisher of Skeptic magazine, the host of the Science Salon podcast, a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University and the author of a number of New York Times bestselling books.
Jim Sillars
Advisory Council
James Sillars is a Scottish politician and a leading figure in the campaign for Scottish independence. Sillars served as a Labour Party MP for South Ayrshire from 1970 to 1976. He founded and led the Scottish Labour Party in 1976, continuing as MP for South Ayrshire until he lost the seat in 1979. Sillars joined the Scottish National Party in 1980 and later served as MP for Glasgow Govan after winning a by-election in 1988, and was Deputy Leader of the Scottish National Party.
Paul Staines
Advisory Council
Paul Staines is the Editor-in-Chief of the Guido Fawkes website.
Prof David Starkey
Advisory Council
David Starkey is an English constitutional historian and a well-known radio and television personality.
Prof Doug Stokes
Advisory Council
Doug Stokes is Professor of International Security and Strategy at the University of Exeter.
Dr Zoe Strimpel
Advisory Council
Zoe Strimpel is a British journalist, writer, commentator, and historian of gender and relationships in modern Britain. She is a columnist for The Sunday Telegraph.
Dr Radomir Tylecote
Advisory Council
Dr Radomir Tylecote is a Fellow of the Institute of Economic Affairs. Radomir was formerly a member of the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT), where he was an external advisor to HM Treasury. He was also a co-founder of the Free Speech Union and Research Director.
Dr Joanna Williams
Advisory Council
Joanna Williams is the founder of the think tank Cieo and director of the Freedom, Democracy and Victimhood Project at Civitas. She is an author, commentator and a columnist at Spiked.
Dr Tim Williams
Advisory Council
Tim Williams is a management consultant based in Sydney. Before moving to Australia, he worked as a special advisor to various Labour ministers in the Blair and Brown Governments and was CEO of the Thames Gateway London Partnership.
Scottish Advisory Council
Tom Burns
Scottish Advisory Council
Tom Burns is a full-time train driver and former ASLEF official.
Joanna Cherry KC MP
Scottish Advisory Council
An SNP MP since 2015, Joanna Cherry KC has served as Justice spokesperson for the SNP Group at Westminster and is a practising Scottish Advocate.
Puneet Dwivedi
Scottish Advisory Council
Puneet Dwivedi is a former Vice President for Scotland in the Hindu Forum Britain.
Murdo Fraser MSP
Scottish Advisory Council
Murdo Fraser has been MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife since 2001. He is currently the Scottish Conservatives spokesman on Covid Recovery, having previously held a variety of roles in the Party, including Deputy Leader.
Jamie Gillies
Scottish Advisory Council
Jamie Gillies was a leader of the Free To Disagree Campaign which led the opposition to the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Bill.
Brent Haywood
Scottish Advisory Council
Brent Haywood is a partner and solicitor advocate at Lindsays LLP. He has been in private practice for 30 years covering commercial disputes and public law. He was involved in the Judicial Review that saw some Coronavirus regulations in Scotland declared unlawful.
Peter Kearney
Scottish Advisory Council
Peter Kearney is the Director of Communications for the Catholic Church in Scotland.
Penny Lewis
Scottish Advisory Council
Penny Lewis is a Lecturer in Architecture and Urban Planning at the University of Dundee.
Jenny Lindsay
Jenny Lindsay is a writer, poet and performer, who is also an award-winning programmer of literary events. She won a John Byrne Award for Critical Thinking in 2020.
Iain Macwhirter
Scottish Advisory Council
Iain Macwhirter is an award-winning political columnist for the Herald and the author of several books including Disunited Kingdom. He is a former Rector of Edinburgh University.
Lindsay Paterson
Scottish Advisory Council
Lindsay Paterson is Professor of Education Policy at Edinburgh University.
Jim Sillars
Scottish Advisory Council
Jim Sillars has served as both a Labour and SNP MP and is a former Deputy Leader of the SNP.
Kapil Summan
Scottish Advisory Council
Kapil Summan is the editor of Scottish Legal News, a daily news service for lawyers.
Neil Thin
Scottish Advisory Council
Neil Thin is a Senior Lecturer in Social Anthropology at Edinburgh University.
Adam Tomkins
Scottish Advisory Council
Adam Tomkins is a former Conservative MSP and has been the John Millar Chair in Public Law at the University of Glasgow since 2003.
Tom Walker
Scottish Advisory Council
Tom Walker is a businessman who campaigned for Brexit in the 2016 referendum.