Officers & Council

Brian is President of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce and Chief Executive of Foyle Port.

Brian was elected as the 76^th President of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce in December 2018, previously serving as the Chamber’s Vice President. During his time as President, Brian’s focus for his Presidency will be to support the members of the Chamber by providing strong guidance and leadership.

He was appointed as the Chief Executive and Harbour Commissioner of Foyle Port in 2003. Prior to his current role, Brian was the Director of Harland and Wolff and has extensive experience in ship design, project management and maritime economics. He is a Chartered Director, a Fellow of the Institute of Directors and a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.

Brian is also a former Council Member of the British Ports Association and the Confederation of British Industries. He is currently a Board Member of the Northern Ireland Council of the Prince’s Trust.

Redmond is Regional Manager of Danske Bank in the northwest and Vice President of Londonderry Chamber of Commerce, as well as past President of Londonderry Junior Chamber.

Redmond is a career banker, having joined the industry in 1986 and worked through most roles to his current position. His time in banking has allowed him to gain a wealth of experience across the banking sectors including Branch Banking, Business and Corporate Banking,

and Mortgage Services.

He has worked throughout Northern Ireland but is delighted to be now based in Derry-Londonderry. He has a keen interest in supporting the business community in the northwest and has given his experience on the boards of Noribic, Limavady College and NW Board of Young Enterprise. He has also been on the board of Foyle Foodbank and has worked to fund raise for Children In Crossfire.

Jennifer McKeever is Past President of the Londonderry Chamber and Managing Director of the Airporter coach service, connecting passengers between Derry-Londonderry and the Belfast airports.

Over more than 20 years in business, Airporter has carried 1.5 million passengers. Airporter is an award-winning industry leader, with a reputation for excellence in customer service and for the use of innovation in transport.

In 2018 Airporter invested £1 million pounds in a customised base with a view to expansion and development.

Airporter is a World Host recognised business, and is accredited in Investors in People (Silver Award).

Jennifer is also Chair of the Tourism Skills group of Derry City and Strabane District Council and is a frequent contributor to issues relating to connectivity, infrastructure and tourism.

As President of the Chamber in 2018 she had the opportunity to represent Chamber on Brexit related issues to British and Irish government, and participated on delegations to Brussels and Westminster on Brexit and City Deals.

George is Chairman of Fleming Agri-Products Ltd.

On leaving Foyle College in 1973, George started working in the family agricultural engineering business in St Johnston in Co Donegal, experiencing all aspects of practical and management roles within the business. In 1983 Fleming Agri Products was established in Newbuildings with George taking sole control in 1988.

Embracing new product design alongside modern production technology to develop a range of innovative farm machinery products, George steered and developed the company to the forefront of the agricultural machinery market in the UK and Ireland as well as developing new export markets in Europe, Australia and New Zealand. George is a past President of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce in 2017.

After graduating Andrew worked with AECOM in London and York before acting as project manager for  a major infrastructure project with Transit New Zealand in Auckland.

Since returning home in 2007 Andrew has continued as the fifth generation to run Fleming Engineering in St Johnston, Donegal.

Fleming Engineering has provided engineering solutions since 1860, specialising in the provision of steel distribution, powder coating and roller doors services to the construction and agri sectors.

In 2012 Fleming Engineering expanded into Northern Ireland through the acquisition of Norwest Roofing Systems  (Omagh). Andrew negotiated Fleming Engineering through a significant restructuring process in the aftermath of the economic downturn and today the company employs over 35 staff in the northwest.

Andrew is also heavily involved in the promotion and administration of Cricket in Ireland.

Andrew joined the Board of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce in 2016 and draws on his experience within the transport sector, family business, and the sports industry.

Damien is Executive Director of Engineering at the Seagate Technology facility in Derry.

He joined the company in 1994, and has held a number of positions in Process Engineering, Technology Transfer, Product Analysis and Six Sigma business improvement.

Since 2004 he has led the Process Engineering team of around 200 scientists, engineers and technicians engaged in product development and volume manufacturing of recording heads for computer hard drives. The Springtown facility is one of only five such sites in the world.

Damien is a native of this city, returning home when Seagate set up their facility in 1994.

He is a non-executive director of Irish Manufacturing Research, a cross-sector organisation supporting advanced manufacturing in Ireland. He is also currently a member of CBI Northern Ireland Regional Council.

Dawn is the principal of the progressive, award winning accountancy practice, Dawn McLaughlin & Co.

She is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland (FCA) and has a BSc (Hons) in Accounting and Economics. Dawn trained and qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Price Waterhouse where she managed the SME department in the North West branch before establishing her own practice.

For the past 34 years Dawn has specialised in advising locally owned and managed SME’s throughout the UK and Ireland.

Dawn is currently Chair of the Chartered Accountants North West Network, she has been the Chair of the Institute of Management – NW Ulster Branch, a member of the Regional Board for Northern Ireland and also on the Member Services Committee of the Ulster Society of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland as the NW representative and a member of the Board of the local leadership team of Business in the Community.

She was founder member of the Support My Business NI Initiative providing mentoring and workshops on a pro bono basis to Northern Ireland businesses.

Donna is a director of Moran’s Retail Ltd, alongside her husband John.

Independent retailers, they have a Centra store in the Strand Road, a Centra store in Coleraine and a SuperValu supermarket in Ballykelly.

Donna is passionate about business because that is what she has been brought up with.

She has worked in retail for her entire life as her father owned a petrol station on the Buncrana Road. She managed her father’s exhaust centre, educating herself in all things car related, joined forces with her tyre centre manager husband John and bought over her father’s business. They started in 1986 with their tyre and exhaust centre on the Strand Road. They rebranded it in 2004 to Breco – bringing in the letters of their three children’s names – and 1996 opened the Strand Road petrol station.

They have been at the Strand Road for 21 years now.  They knocked down the store in July 2018 and the much anticipated new building will open again in March.

Donna says she is a people person and is very passionate about her staff as well as her customers. She says her ethos is ‘without great staff, we wouldn’t have great customers coming in the door’.

Eighrean is Junior Chamber President and Branch Manager at Bank of Ireland UK. She has been an active member of Junior Chamber since 2014 and took over as President in December 2018.

Junior Chamber locally is a growing network of professionals which ‘Empowers Young People to create positive change’ through business development, personal growth, active citizenship and international opportunity.

She has been an employee with Bank of Ireland since 2006 and has a wealth of experience in financial products, relationship management, business development and leadership.

She is Branch Manager in Limavady and also Business Development Manager throughout the North West region. She plays an integral part in assisting Bank of Ireland to fulfil its purpose of enabling customers, colleagues and communities to thrive.

Gavin is Managing Director of Nuprint Technologies Limited who lead the way in Irish design and print, specialising in the manufacture of premium quality commercial and industrial labels.

As Managing Director, Gavin has responsibility for all aspects of the business and in the last two years has spearheaded an investment of over £2.5m in state-of-the-art equipment as well as an extensive staff training programme resulting in 42% growth in 2017.

He has been Deputy Lieutenant County Borough of Londonderry, Co-Chair Derry City and Strabane District Council (DCSDC) Strategic Growth Partnership, Chairman of Education and Skills Implementation Group, DCSDC, President of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce in 2016, Vice Chair of the Board of Governors: NWRC and Foyle College, Member of Department of Employment and Learning Expert Panel reviewing Apprenticeships and Youth Training, member of the Rotary Club of Londonderry since 2007 and President 2012/13 and VP of City of Derry Rugby Football Club.

Louise is Director of People and Performance at Learning Pool.

She started her career in the financial industry with Bank of Ireland and Deutsche Bank, in a variety of roles before moving to HML in Derry in 2004 in an operational process role.

Louise has been with Learning Pool since its foundation, taking up a full time role seven years ago to prepare the business for scale-able growth, create a people-oriented approach and deliver world class customer service. Since then the business has achieved sustained growth of 400 per cent.

She led Learning Pool’s listing on the Sunday Times Best Small Companies in 2016 and 2017, gained two star ‘outstanding’ employee engagement in the Best Companies awards in 2018 and 2019 and was project lead for Learning Pool’s current gold accreditation status with Investors in People.

Louise has board level responsibility for finance, human resources and legal and acts as company secretary for the Board of Directors.

Padraig founded independent software vendor Singularity in 1994, grew it to 250 people. The company’s HQ was in Derry with offices in London, New York, Singapore and Hyderabad India, Singularity was acquired by Kofax in 2011.  

Padraig now chairs Hunter Apparel Solutions in Derry, FlowForma in Dublin, Scattr in Derry and LitheIT in Glasgow.  

He also sits on the boards of InvestNI, the NWRC, St Mary’s College, Verbal and Magee expansion lobby group U4D.  He is a member of the DCSDC’s Education and Skills Group, City Deal partnership and for the council chairs the Learning Cities Initiative.  

He is a past board member of the NI Software Industry Federation, FOSEC, CultureTECH, Oakgrove Integrated PS and Ergo in Dublin.

He was Chamber President from 2010 to 2012 and received an OBE in 2009 for services to NI industry. He is an active technology start up company investor.

Paul is an optometrist and partner in Curtis Opticians.

He returned home in 1997, after training and working in London, and became a partner in the family business in 1999, the third generation to do so.

Curtis Opticians, based in Carlisle Road, is a multi-award winning independent opticians originally established in 1928 by Harold P Curtis.

Curtis Opticians provide eye care and optical services to all sectors from both sides of the border, including corporate, private, NHS, and the HSE in Donegal.

Steven is a Director with Cavanagh Kelly, Chartered Accountants.

Steven qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 1988. In 1994 Steven joined the Western Health and Social Services Board (WHSSB) as Chief Internal Auditor. He then became Director of Finance and Information, and in 2000 was appointed as WHSSB Chief Executive.

From 2006 – 2017, Steven was a partner with mid-tier accountancy practice, establishing and leading the firm’s Consultancy and Internal Audit division. He was also Managing partner of the firm from 2010- 2017.

Steven is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, a Member of the Chartered Institute of Internal Auditors, a qualified Executive coach and and holds a BSSc in Accounting and Economics. He was a Trustee of Age NI from 2007 – 2017, a member of Londonderry Chamber of Commerce from 2006 – 2016 and is currently a Trustee with Verbal Group and a Governor with Foyle College.

He rejoined the Chamber board on 1 January 2019.

Julie Pollock owns Consult HR. After spending 12 years working for a large manufacturing company and heading up the HR Department, she was expecting baby number four and facing redundancy.

Shortly after this she launched Consult HR, specialising in helping managers and business owners with their staffing problems. The company is in their 10^th year of business and have a built a strong reputation based on client satisfaction, stopping clients making costly mistakes and providing instant solutions to staffing queries being our strengths.

Julie volunteers on a number of boards locally and just recently joined the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce Board.  She has a keen interest in the difficulties that employers are currently facing which are having a detrimental impact on their bottom line.