About us

Laura Bigley
Co-Chair

Laura manages the Flood Risk Management Team at Lancashire County Council. She began her career at Lancashire as a planning officer specialising in environmental planning, before moving into flood risk management and leading the County Council’s work on sustainable drainage and planning. Laura has also worked in her native Merseyside as their Flood Risk Coordinator leading the FCERM Partnership and working with the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, before returning to Lancashire in 2020.

Laura has been a vocal advocate for multi-functional sustainable drainage systems on developments for a number of years encouraging others across the North West region to utilise the planning system to best effect to deliver this. Laura works closely with the North West Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (RFCC) playing a role in delivering the Committee’s Business Plan, The Flood Hub website and the North West SuDS Pro-forma as well as being regional lead for Planning and Development to 2025. Laura has also been involved with numerous national project to improve sustainable drainage, flood risk and planning as well as ordinary watercourse regulation.

It was in 2013 that Laura first got involved in what was to become ASA, joining the Executive Board in 2020 and becoming both the Reference Group Chair and the Vice Chair. Laura has co-chaired the Association since September 2022.

Vikki Keeble
Co-Chair

Vikki is the Sustainable Drainage Team Leader at Buckinghamshire Council. Vikki joined the council in 2015, after the commencement of the LLFA’s statutory consultee responsibilities. Since starting at Buckinghamshire, Vikki has been instrumental in the development of the Sustainable Drainage team. She has also guided the team through the transition from a county council to a unitary authority. Alongside providing advice on major developments, Vikki has developed local arrangements so that the team provide advice on some minor developments.

Vikki has been a keen member of the Association of SuDS Authorities since its transition from LASOO. Previously acting as the organisations secretary, then moving to the Vice Chair role and currently holds the role of Co-Chair. In her Co-Chair role, Vikki wants to ensure that ASA continues to develop its network and help members with the successful delivery of SuDS.

Vicky Boorman

Vicky is lead on Water for the Greater London Authority, in the Climate Adaptation Team. Previously spent ten years initiating the LLFA role in London Borough of Hillingdon and developing the programme of flood risk delivery as the Flood Risk Manager, as well as the then new statutory role in planning.

Prior to this experience in a variety of flood risk roles in Operations and Flood Risk and strategic pan region roles over ten years at the Environment Agency.

Experienced in SuDs retrofit and integration through planning. While at the London Borough of Hillingdon has won the Susdrain award for large scale new development for St Andrews Park and ICE London award for Eastcote Town Centre improvements including rain gardens.

Experienced in funding applications, programme management, managing flood risk projects and engagement, incident management and the development of policies all flood risk plans and water and strategies to support strategic planning.
Current Chair the London Drainage Engineers Group representing 33 London Lead Local Flood Authorities.

Vicky has a 2:1 BA degree in Planning Studies and Geography and a Post graduate Certificate in Environmental Water Management from Cranfield and Chartered with CIWEM.

Glen Westmore
Co-Chair

Glen Westmore is the Spatial Strategy Programme Manager at Surrey County Council. An Environmental Engineer by training, he leads on the overall delivery of the Spatial Development Strategy and is embedding climate resilience and nature recovery into wider housing and infrastructure delivery.

Previously he headed up the team assessing planning applications and providing SuDS design and retrofit advice across the county. As well as leading on the SuDS and Ordinary Watercourse agendas, he had the Climate Change Adaptation programme for the County Council.

Glen has been at SCC since 2015 but previously worked at West Sussex County Council covering climate change and LLFA duties, and at the Environment Agency as an Environmental Project Manager.

Glen is one of the co-Chairs of ASA and enjoys the challenge of wider strategic thinking and government lobbying on ASA’s behalf.

Paul Maddison
Vice Chair & Treasurer

Paul has been the Flood Risk Manager for Wakefield District Council since 2012. His team is involved in all aspects of drainage and flood risk within the district including provision of advice on planning applications, flood investigations and working with partners to deliver schemes to reduce the risk of flooding.

Paul started his career with West Yorkshire County Council in 1980 as a trainee civil engineer. He then joined Wakefield following the abolition of the County Council in 1986. At Wakefield he was involved in the Council’s programme of reclamation of former colliery sites and derelict land becoming involved in drainage and flood risk in 2006. He was originally involved in the design and construction of flood alleviation schemes moving onto all aspects of flood risk when he became team manager.

Chris Osborne
Young officer group chair/ sponsorship co-ordinator

Chris manages the Inland Flood Risk team at Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole (BCP) Council and is part of the wider FCERM management team that includes Capital Projects, Asset Management and Strategy, Policy & Environment. He began his career working for Exeter University in their estate development department, setting up project and budget management systems for multi-million pound capital projects. During this period he studied part time for an MSc in Urban Water Systems and received a distinction from Exeter University in 2014.

Following his post-graduate studies, Chris moved to the Dorchester and worked for Dorset County Council (now Dorset Council) where he worked in all areas of LLFA delivery, eventually progressing from assistant engineer to project (senior engineer). He has a particular interest in ensuring that new development is sustainable, resilient, and multifunctional, given the expected impacts of climate change and in promoting the importance of Development Control in reducing flood risk.

After seven years in Dorset Council, Chris was appointed as Inland Flood Risk Manager at BCP Council in Jan 2022 having also just joined the ASA executive. Since moving to BCP he has been responsible for building the Inland Flood Risk team and developing BCPs Lead Local Flood Authority service. Chris is presently working alongside planning colleagues on delivering Strategic Flood Risk Assessments for BCP (Level 1 & 2) and building an in-house modelling resource to help progress Surface Water Management Plans.

Roberta Barna

Roberta is a Senior Flood Risk Consultant at Staffordshire County Council (via Waterman Aspen). With over 10 years experiences across the public and private sector, she now specialises in the statutory planning function for the LLFA working on the response for major multi-phase developments as well as taking the lead on strategic SuDS and flood risk policy.

Roberta started her career in GIS and after completing a PGCert in Flood and Costal Risk Management moved into consultancy. She has a wealth of experience in flood risk assessments and drainage strategies as well as her technical skills in hydraulic modelling and developing policy documents for local authorities before moving back to the public sector in 2021.

Roberta is also a keen advocate for improving mental health in the workplace and improving the opportunities for women in the engineering and construction sector. She is part of the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Special Project Group for Waterman Aspen and is a qualified Mental Health First Aider.

Hiatt Jackson

Hiatt Jackson is a Senior Flood Risk Management Officer with extensive experience in the planning and delivery of sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) and surface water flood risk management. Based in Kingston upon Hull, Hiatt works closely with planning authorities, water companies and other risk management authorities to support practical, policy compliant SuDS delivery within urban environments.

Hiatt has led and contributed to a range of SuDS retrofit and natural flood management projects, with a particular focus on blue green infrastructure that delivers measurable flood risk reduction alongside wider environmental benefits. She has also led the development of local SuDS and flood risk guidance documents for Hull City Council, helping to translate national policy and standards into clear, locally applicable guidance to support consistent decision making.

As a Board Member of the Association of SuDS Authorities, Hiatt supports ASA’s aim of promoting high quality and consistent SuDS delivery nationally. She leads the development of ASA’s bi annual newsletter, helping to share best practice, emerging policy and practical experience from across the local authority SuDS community.

Hannah Purkis

Hannah Purkis is the Flood & Water Manager at Suffolk County Council and an Executive Board Member of the Association of SuDS Authorities (ASA). A Chartered Water and Environmental Manager (C.WEM MCIWEM), she leads a high-performing LLFA team focused on digital transformation and strengthening local flood risk policy. Hannah is a dedicated mentor and advocate for the sector, passionate about opening the industry to people of all backgrounds, from young professionals to career-movers, to build a more inclusive and representative workforce.

Chris Dunderdale

Chris is an experienced Senior Flood Risk Officer at Lancashire County Council, working within the Lead Local Flood Authority since 2013. Chris specialises in sustainable drainage systems and ordinary watercourse regulation, overseeing the delivery of the Lead Local Flood Authority’s statutory duties in planning and ordinary watercourse regulation.

Chris has a particular focus on the design and delivery of high quality, multifunctional sustainable drainage systems, natural flood management features, and nature based solutions, with a strong interest in protecting and enhancing the water environment and using data and evidence to support effective decision making in flood risk management.

Chris has been actively involved with the ASA for several years and currently sits on the ASA Executive Board, having previously served as Chair of the Technical and Data Management Workgroup and as Training and Development Coordinator.

Innes Thompson
Sitting Guest

Innes Thomson is the Chief Executive of ADA, the Association of Drainage Authorities, and a standing invited guest to the ASA Board. As a fellow membership services organization with closely similar objectives focusing on water and flood risk management, ADA provides administrative services and office support to ASA. Partnership working is a crucial component of success in managing water and the working connection between ADA and ASA brings together the breadth of interest in all forms of sustainable drainage on a catchment-wide basis. As a Civil Engineer, Innes has worked with water for virtually all of his professional career and is a keen supporter of the working linkage between ASA and ADA.