Additional Board member biographies

Steve Bell

Steve Bell is an independent member of the RTGS/CHAPS Board and its Risk Committee. 

Steve has over 30 years’ experience in financial services, including 21 years as a Technology Risk Partner at EY. He was Service Quality Leader for EY’s FS Advisory business where he operated as first-line risk management leader and a member of the Advisory Leadership team driving strategy for the business from 2013 to 2020. He was also the Quality & Risk Management leader for the UK FS Advisory practice from 2012 to 2020. In parallel, his client work as a Partner included advisory and auditor assignments across the financial services sector on areas such as IT change programmes, resilience, cyber security and regulatory investigations.

Steve is currently a trustee and Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee at Action For Children.

Michael D’Souza

Michael D’Souza is an independent member of the Bank of England’s RTGS/CHAPS Board and is Chair of its Risk Committee.

Michael has over 30 years of experience in investment banking having held senior executive positions in the UK, USA, Canada and Japan.  Michael was a Managing Director and member of the board of directors of Merrill Lynch International, a global broker-dealer, and was also Chair of the board Risk Committee. Prior to this, he was Chief Executive Officer of Merrill Lynch Capital Markets Bank, which managed the firm’s derivatives and foreign exchange business internationally.

Michael has also served as an independent senior advisor at the Bank’s Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA). In this role he focused on corporate governance and risk management across the UK financial services sector. He chaired or acted as an independent member of a range of formal PRA Senior Management Regime interview boards bringing an informed and experienced practitioner's perspective to decision making. In addition, Michael is the independent Chair of the Regulatory Arbitrage and Market Consequences Committee and an independent member of the Bank’s Resolvability Assessment Framework Steering Committee.

Michael has also served as an Independent Non-Executive Director of the Council of King’s College, University of London. As part of this role, he was Chair of the Finance Committee and a member of the Nomination Committee and Remuneration Committee.

Noel Gordon

Noel Gordon is an senior independent member of the RTGS/CHAPS Board.

Noel has 35 years’ experience in financial services, advising banks on business transformation using digital technologies, analytics, and new business models. Until his retirement in 2012, Noel was global managing director of Accenture’s Banking Industry Practice responsible for innovation and client services for the largest multi-national banking clients of the Firm including major technology renewal programmes. He was also a non-executive director of the Payment Systems Regulator and held Board and Chair positions in the NHS including Chair of NHS Digital, the technology captive of the NHS. 

Noel currently holds Board positions at Assura plc, Bestway Panacea Holdings Ltd and Telstra Health and advises start-ups in Medtech and Fintech. 

Michael Jones

Michael Jones is Head of Payment Operations. He has responsibility for the Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system and the CHAPS payment scheme. He is a member of the RTGS/CHAPS Board. 

Michael has undertaken a wide variety of roles across our operational and policy areas over the last 20 years, including acting as an advisor on operations in the International Banking Directorate of the PRA (2015-16) and running the RTGS system (2014-15). 

Michael has a BA and MPhil in History from Birmingham University.

Jackie Keogh

Jackie Keogh is an Independent Member of the RTGS/CHAPS Board and its Risk Committee. 

Jackie has over 30 years financial industry experience spanning government, regulators, banks, network providers and payment institutions.

Jackie is currently a Non-Executive Director for UK Export Finance and Chair of an FCA and Industry Working Group. Previously Jackie has held roles as an Advisor for the FCA, a bank Supervisory Board Member, subjected to the FMA, and Board Director of Custom House Financial (UK) Ltd. Former Non-Executive Director of Idea Group, a business systems company.

Laura Wallis

Laura Wallis is Director of UK Deposit Takers, responsible for the supervision of the UK’s banks, building societies and credit unions. She has over 20 years’ experience in central banking and financial services regulation, covering supervision, policy, financial stability and risk. These roles have placed Laura at the centre of work on responding to the financial crisis and implementing reforms to strengthen the financial sector. 

Laura was most recently the Principal Private Secretary to the Governor and prior to that held a variety of Head of Division roles including leading Financial Market Infrastructure Policy, the Bank’s work on EU Withdrawal and Overseas Banks Supervision. 

Laura joined the Financial Services Authority Graduate Scheme in 2003 and transferred to the Bank of England with the PRA in 2013. She studied economics at Warwick University and Birkbeck College and is a 2016 fellow on the Forward Institute Leadership Programme.  Laura co-chaired the Bank’s women’s network (Women in the Bank) from 2015 to 2018 and was a founder of the joint Bank, Fed and ECB Conference on Gender and Career Progression. She is now co-Executive sponsor of the Bank’s parents network and Executive Sponsor of the Bank's Mentoring Scheme.