Officers & 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.

Aidan is a Director in Allstate and will be leading the Allstate Business Line Enablement Technology group within Allstate Northern Ireland whilst continuing his Leadership role within Allstate Canada, where he currently holds the position of Director of Production Health.

Aidan, based in Allstate NI’s Derry office, is driving production support strategy and vision for Allstate, through his global organisation across 3 different timezone.  Since graduating from Queen’s University B.Eng (Hons) in Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Aidan has worked in a number of global organisations including Ericsson, NEC, Answer Financial, Encompass Insurance and Allstate.

He has lived in global locations including around Europe, South America and Australia. He brings almost 25 years of Software Engineering experience to the role and has built out teams comprising of many different engineering disciplines, including Developers, BAs, Product Managers, Test Engineers and Infrastructure Engineers.

Before throttling back in 2007, Roy had been an executive director at Coolkeeragh Power Ltd from 1994 to 2007. Since then he has worked in a largely non-executive capacity in the public and the voluntary sectors and as co-founder of a number of innovative companies across a range of industries – including renewable energy, digitization of democratic services and financial services.

Roy served two terms as a Commissioner of Londonderry Port & Harbour and was a non-executive Director of the City of Derry Building Society for almost three years, prior to its merger with the Progressive Building Society in 2014. He served 8 years as Chairman of CODA (Operations) Ltd, the operating company of City of Derry Airport until May 2018. He served previously as a director of the Londonderry Chamber of Commerce between 2007 and 2018, before re-joining the board as a director and as Treasurer in March 2020. He is currently Chairman of School Employer Connections and is a director of Modern Democracy Ltd.

Roy is a Chartered Director, a Fellow of the Institute of Directors and a Fellow of the Institute of Financial Accountants.  He is married to Patricia and has four adult children

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.

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’.

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.

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.

Redmond is Regional Manager of Danske Bank in the northwest and a former 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.