Lunch with Leon

Leon Daniels’ lunchtime guest is Elizabeth de Jong from Logistics UK. Their starter sees them mull over working-from-home and its benefits, before they move onto the main course where they chat about the changes in logistics and deliveries this year. They debate why the government should regard freight and logistics as part of the country’s critical infrastructure and how to get more talent into t...

Tools in the toolbox – how many do we need? Graeme Cooper is Project Director / Transport Decarbonisation at National Grid and, fresh from his appearance on Top Gear, he chats with Leon Daniels about how, in the last week, all the decarbonisation jigsaw bits are finally coming together. Graeme talks with an easy engaging energy and passion, presenting serious thought leadership in an easy-to-diges...

Stripping off on the roads? The Naked Highway. If you’ve not come across the expression, then the Naked Highway is not what you might think... Chatting over lunch with Leon Daniels OBE is James Haluch Managing Director – Highways and Waste Collections, at Amey and they get to grips with what our roads should look like in the future – and the Naked Highway is part of this. They start by talking abo...

With a long and illustrious career in business and transport, Steve Norris is best-known as Minister for Transport in London (1992-7) “the toughest job I ever did.” No-nonsense and straight-talking, he ran for Mayor of London in 2000 and 2004, but lost on both occasions to Ken Livingstone who, he tells Leon Daniels, was “the best Mayor by a country mile.” There are terrific anecdotes about London...

As we navigate through uncharted territory, Leon Daniels catches up with Guillaume Fleuti - MD and Head, Infrastructure, Transport and Manufacturing and Europe at Lloyds Bank – to chat about everything from the move to zero emission stimulus, “good for business and good for the UK,” to the key role that banks are bringing to the economy at the moment. They mull over whether the ‘bundling together’...

She’s the busiest person on the transport network, giving information to 6.5m people every day; but it’s her voice, rather than her face that is best known. The ‘voice’ of London Buses, Emma Hignett, chats with Leon Daniels over lunch about her work as a voice-over and how the Lancastrian’s voice is upmarket but utterly approachable. She talks about how she changed career from being a ballet dance...

Greg Harris is right at front end of the latest developments on the road to net-zero.  As Global Electrification Services Leader at HORIBA MIRA, his role includes developing strategy around electrification. Best known as the UK industry’s first vehicle test track  - called the Motor Industry Research Association (MIRA) opened in 1949 on a former airfield in Leicestershire -  Greg chats over lunch...

Matt Ginsberg, author, teacher and entrepreneur once tried to sell to London intelligent traffic lights to speed up the traffic. At Transport for London, MD Leon Daniels surprised him by declining since that was the opposite of what was wanted. A specialist in AI (artificial intelligence) since 1983, Matt chats with Leon about why we travel too much, but why some things will have to remain face-to...

Lucy Yu is the Director of Public Policy at Voi Scooters. With eScooters increasingly popular around the world, Leon Daniels chats about the Swedish company’s trials in the UK, one of 11 European countries it serves. They chew over the apparent lack of regulation and Leon discovers that while illegal on UK roads, a trial with the DfT means that a number of UK cities - but not, so far, London - are...

This special episode comes from the recent ITT Hub Open Day at Warwick University where 30 partners, current and prospective exhibitors discovered how to plan, design and run a Covid secure exhibition stand. Leon talks to some of the key stakeholders at the event, the ITT Hub team, as well as Charlie Cox from Natural Green CS, the event partner.

After a bad taxi experience in 2011, Bhavish Aggarwal resolved to do something better. The result was to co-found Ola Cabs in India.  In 2015, along with co-founder Ankit Bhati, they were the youngest to be included in that year's list of richest Indians.  Since then, Ola Cabs has expanded to Australia, New Zealand and now London. Last year the company was valued at £6.5bn and at 35-years-old Bhav...

Running buses is a people business, so the appointment of HR specialist Jane Reakes Davies as MD First Cymru, shouldn’t come as a surprise.  Yet it’s still often the case that the traditional career route to becoming a bus MD, tends to be through engineering or operations. Over lunch with Leon Daniels, she chats about the different perspectives of the role of a bus MD, and what it really means, al...

Barrister, butcher and now busman: John Clarfelt has revolutionised on-bus payments with his start-up Ticketer which now has 25,000 on-bus electronic ticket machines (ETMs) in the UK. Having qualified as a barrister and also been a butcher, Ticketer is his third venture. Over Lunch with Leon Daniels, he chats about how cashless payments have changed society and what the possibility is for charging...

“Data is the new oil,” says EnRoute founder Aviv Frenkel. ‘Shop with us and ride for free’ is the new calling card for retailers thanks to an entirely new transport system developed by EnRoute. Over lunch, Leon Daniels chats with EnRoute founder Aviv Frenkel about the genuinely exciting development in transport, where public transport agencies and companies come together to provide free travel to...

Young people: Don’t worry about the recession, as there are career opportunities right now in transport for engineering and other high-skill roles such as operations. That’s the upbeat message from Howard Collins OBE, who says that as other sectors shrink, transport offers good opportunities for young people aspiring for a skilled career. Chatting over Lunch with Leon Daniels, he argues that the t...

Dave Joshua is the man who is going to ‘revolutionise the bus industry’. That’s quite a claim for this native of Gloucestershire who is now General Manager for Optibus in the UK and Europe. With a background in data and software, he’s also a ‘newbie’ in the bus industry and brings with him clarity of thought that comes from standing outside of the wood, while the rest of us are in with the trees....

“A force to be reckoned with,” is how Leon Daniels introduces Anna Delvecchio in his ‘Lunch with Leon’ podcast. One of the most influential women in transport, she joined the industry as an apprentice and after a rising through a varied range of posts is now Development Director of Transportation at Mott MacDonald. She talks about why the industry needs to change the perception of transport among...

With 23m people in city that is a modern metropolis whose location links Hong Kong to China’s mainland, Shenzhen is now well into its post-COVID-19 recovery phase. So, what’s life like post-lockdown and what lessons can we learn?  To find out Leon Daniels speaks with Joe Ma, Deputy General Manager of Shenzhen Bus Group and also Chair of UITP’s Taxi and Ride-hailing Committee. They discuss the econ...

We need to think differently: That’s the challenge that Jo Bamford throws down to operators in a chat over lunch with Leon Daniels. Part of JCB’s global vehicle business and son of Lord Bamford, Jo is a passionate advocate for hydrogen, aiming to bring hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles to the world on a large scale . Having set up Ryse Hydrogen in 2017 to produce and supply hydrogen, last year Jo hit th...

ITT Hub’s ‘Lunch with Leon’, hosted by Leon Daniels OBE, takes a new twist as he talks with Matt Eisenegger, MD of Commercial Vehicle Media & Publishing, that publishes a suite of truck and logistics magazines. Ahead of the launch of Matt’s own ITT Hub podcast next week - called CV Focus - they discuss the sudden changes brought to freight and logistics. He also reveals who his first guest on...

This Lunch with Leon special features Steve Whiteway, President of the Confederation of Passenger Transport and Ian Jones, industry legal advisor as they returned from Honk for Hope in central London, the third rally in the UK to draw attention to issues in the coach industry, a diverse sector with a ‘lost cause’. With 42K people in the UK employed directly by coach operators, contributing £6 bill...

Featuring Isbrand Ho, Senior Director of BYD Company and Managing Director BYD Europe, along with Frank Thorpe, Managing Director BYD UK. Speaking from the Netherlands, Isbrand talks about the opportunities which will emerge following the current crisis.  · How does public transport emerge cleaner and better without leaving anyone behind?  · Will volumes of bus orders come back, despite current nu...

In the second edition of Lunch with Leon, Leon Daniels OBE hosts Professor David Begg – author, academic, advisor to secretaries of state, conference entrepreneur and self-confessed “general no good troublemaker”.  Leon and Professor Begg discuss how far and how deeply the legacy of where we are now will track into the future. With five years of change compressed into the six-month period of the p...

Leon and Paul discuss the state of the industry and how the past and present will inform our future. The podcast includes discussion on public transport and the effect of changes in habits, clean air and how to maintain the momentum post coronavirus, support needed for the bus and coach market, how to attract a younger, more inclusive workforce, government-backed guarantees on investment, plus ele...