Our Team
Nick DeLuca – Chairman
Nick was a founding director of Open Road. He has over 20 years of experience in the corporate affairs world.
Nick began his career in the United States Senate as an aide to the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
He then moved to the UK and joined Westminster Strategy where he was a Board Director until 1995 when he left to be a founding Director at APCO UK. Nick helped build the European and then Global network of APCO Worldwide while developing specialised expertise in cross border, international communications and issues management, with a particular focus on the aviation, aerospace and entertainment industries.
He left in 2003 to operate independently before joining Open Road for its launch in January 2007.
Outside: Sinatra, Springsteen, Sicily
Martin Le Jeune – Director
Martin was a founding director of Open Road, joining the consultancy after three years as director of public affairs at Sky.
Martin’s career began as a fast-stream civil servant in the Cabinet Office where he served as a ministerial private secretary and was on the staff of the Committee on Standards in Public Life. He then moved to communications consultancy Fishburn Hedges and became a board director and head of the consultancy’s corporate responsibility work.
Martin is deputy chairman of the Institute of Business Ethics and a trustee of whistleblowers’ charity Public Concern at Work. He is a fellow of the Centre for Policy Studies.
Outside: singing, running, mowing.
Graham McMillan – Chief Executive
Graham helped to found Open Road in 2007. He was previously head of public affairs and a board director at Fishburn Hedges. While there he won consultant of the year and consultancy of the year in 2005 at the Public Affairs News Awards.
Graham has over 20 years of experience in corporate communications, public affairs, issue and crisis management and corporate responsibility in the UK, the EU and globally.
He is a trustee of two charities in the early years sector.
Outside: theatre, cinema and ferrying small children around.
Victoria Tate – Director
Victoria is a founding Director of Open Road. She worked in public relations and public affairs for around eighteen years both in consultancy and in house.
She spent eight years at corporate communications consultancy, Fishburn Hedges, and was a Board Director there for three years. She worked on a range of issues and crisis management, public sector and consumer issues briefs for clients ranging from the UK government to FTSE 100 companies.
Before setting up Open Road, Victoria held in house and issues positions in the leisure and drinks industry at Spirit Group (now Punch Taverns) and the Portman Group. For her, the more controversial the brief the better.
Outside: media junkie, fashion, and small daughter.
Rebecca Reilly – Director
Rebecca recently joined Open Road from freud communications where she ran a number of retained corporate accounts and campaigns for some of the UK’s biggest companies.
Rebecca previously worked in the corporate practice at Weber Shandwick as well as at a number of smaller agencies.
She loves getting under the skin of big businesses and big issues and the pace of crisis and issues management. Used to working with Chief Execs and marketing teams alike, Rebecca likes working on meaty reputation management briefs and making her clients famous.
Outside: travel and being outdoors.
Andrew Hobson – Associate Director
Andrew joined Open Road in November 2011.
He was previously Associate Director at Insight Public Affairs where he specialised in health and social care policy, helping to build and grow the healthcare client portfolio with a range of healthcare and not for profit clients, including: Lloydspharmacy, Sanofi-aventis, Amgen, Skills for Care and the Anchor Trust.
He joins Open Road after a year studying at New York University for a Masters Degree in Public Administration.
Before Insight Andrew worked for the Labour Party and had roles with Ivor Caplin MP, Jack Straw MP and at the Greater London Assembly.
Outside: Climbing, cycling, dancing like Mick Jagger.
Emma Haselhurst – Associate Director
Emma joined Open Road as a consultant in March 2010.
Emma began her career in BT’s public affairs team, after which she moved to Weber Shandwick for four years, working primarily for healthcare and education clients before joining Open Road. She has continued to specialise in healthcare.
Emma has also worked on Capitol Hill, and has spent time campaigning for congressional races in Illinois (Republican) and South Carolina (Democrat).
She is an alumna of the Becket Chimney Corners YMCA, an outdoor education facility in the Berkshires, Massachusetts.
Outside: baking, films, American culture.
Rosie Clarke – Senior Consultant
Rosie began her career in Parliament, working for Liberal Democrat MP Annette Brooke. During the 2005 General Election she ran Annette Brooke’s re-election campaign, increasing her majority by 5,000 and turning the seat from a Conservative target seat to a Lib Dem safe seat.
She followed this by joining Lansons Communications, working for the financial services specialist agency for four years. During this time she was seconded to the Employers Forum on Age for six months.
Rosie then became public affairs manager at the Personal Accounts Delivery Authority, before joining Open Road as a consultant in 2010.
Outside: running, boxing, and the Archers.
Nicolas Lehmann – Senior Consultant
Nick joined Open Road in April 2007. He works on corporate communications and public affairs accounts on behalf of private sector and trade body clients in the UK, EU and US.
He established the company’s research and monitoring function, and now advises on and executes stakeholder engagement and issues management programmes.
His clients span the transport, healthcare, leisure, environmental and manufacturing sectors.
Nick began his career at BSkyB, as a member of the public affairs team. He is involved in the Friends of Grammar Schools campaign and coordinates the Open Road intern alumni network.
Nick is also a member of the Association of Professional Political Consultants’ Young Consultants’ Committee.
Outside: exercise, promoting Anglo-French relations.
Helen Davison – Consultant
Helen recently joined Open Road from Luther Pendragon where she was working across public affairs and corporate communications, advising clients in sectors ranging from telecoms, healthcare, chemicals, retail, energy and the Church of England.
Before joining Luther Pendragon Helen was a senior researcher at pan-European think tank the Stockholm Network where she specialised in healthcare, energy markets and intellectual property.
Outside: Prosecco, charity shops, hummus.
Hannah Marwood – Consultant
Hannah joined Open Road in January 2011, after over four years in PR and stakeholder communications.
Her career began at Weber Shandwick, where she gained experience in public affairs, media relations and financial communications. She has worked with clients in the energy, healthcare, legal and government sectors.
At Open Road, Hannah is continuing to work across communications disciplines with financial services and healthcare clients.
Outside: reading, cooking, and constantly planning the next overseas adventure.
India Melhuish – Consultant
India joined Open Road from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers where she was leading its public affairs engagement and working on a range of policy initiatives within energy, manufacturing, education and transport. Her work included strengthening the Institution’s position with new MPs and Ministers and raising the profile of engineering with the Coalition Government.
Before this India worked for over two years as a public affairs consultant at DJH Associates where her clients included the National Casino Industry Forum, the Jockey Club and the Historic Houses Association.
Outside: gardening, period dramas, tennis.
Isobel Bradshaw – Consultant
Isobel joined Open Road in October 2010, after three years at Hanover where she specialised in corporate communications, crisis communications and stakeholder relations.
Isobel has worked for clients in a number of different sectors, including telecoms, media and technology, healthcare and professional services, as well as the public sector.
Before Hanover, Isobel was a press officer at O2 covering both reactive media relations and proactive consumer and B2B PR.
Outside: reading, travelling, eating.
Louise Phillips – Consultant
After graduating from the University of Leeds with a BA and an MA in History (specialising in Ancient Greece) Louise joined the Liberal Democrats working as a media assistant on the Brian Paddick Mayoral Campaign. From there she went on to work as a Senior Press Officer for 3 years, during which time she covered a wide range of portfolios including health, education, work & pensions, DCMS, DCLG, science, equalities and DFT. During last year’s General Election, she ran the broadcast team for the party.
After the election, Louise joined TLG Communications, where she worked on a variety of Public Affairs and PR clients, including Swedish hardware chain Clas Ohlson, Asda, Flybe and Boehringer Ingleheim.
Outside: Regents Park, The Marquis of Granby and East London.
John Williams – Consultant
John joined Open Road in June 2010 as head of research from the external relations team at the Office of Fair Trading.
He has also previously worked in Parliament for Simon Hughes MP and as a communications assistant for the Liberal Democrats.
John holds a joint Masters degree in European politics from Sciences Po (Paris) and the University of Bath.
Outside: sport, French literature, beer.
Andrew May – Consultant
Andy joined Open Road in September 2011 as a consultant.
He began his career five years ago working for the Liberal Democrats, scoring success in a number of local election campaigns before moving to the marketing department at Amnesty International UK.
In the last 18 months he worked on several high profile not-for-profit campaigns including Power2010 and Yes to Fairer Votes where he was responsible for a team of staff delivering the ‘Yes2AV’ regional activism and media effort.
He has a broad range of experience covering digital communications, advocacy, media and direct marketing.
Outside: politics, football, blogging.
Catriona Filmer-Bennett – Office Manager
Catriona joined Open Road in January 2012 as Office Manager. She previously worked as the office manager for an executive search firm and graduated from the University of Birmingham in 2010.
Catriona is responsible for the running of the office and her role includes finance and event management.
Outside: bunting, yoga, dark chocolate hob nobs.
Anna Appleton – Researcher
Anna joined Open Road as a researcher in June 2010.
She graduated from York University in July 2010 after studying Politics and Sociology. During her studies, she interned at ComRes and worked part-time for YouGov. She was also Chair of the University of York Conservative Association.
Outside: Knitting, baking and jewellery making.
Alex Savage – Researcher
Alex joined Open Road as a researcher in July 2011. Before this he worked at Lansons Communications for a year, where he worked on public affairs and public relations accounts in the financial services sector, including work with the Isle of Man Government.
Before joining Lansons, Alex interned at Weber Shandwick and worked for Labour North West on the 2010 general election, where he assisted the regional head of press. He graduated from Newcastle University in 2009 with a degree in Politics and Sociology.
Outside: Liverpool FC, Radiohead, swimming.
