Appointment Committee
The Role of the Appointment Committee
In accordance with the AEP Tribunal and Appeal Tribunal Terms of Reference and the Actuarial and Accountancy Schemes, the FRC's People Committee have appointed four individuals, who are independent from the Conduct Committee, who are responsible for appointing individuals as members of the Tribunal Panel.
Members of Appointment Committee
Victoria Smith
Victoria is a qualified solicitor who was admitted to the Roll of solicitors over 25 years ago. She has spent the majority of her working life firstly as a Government Legal Services lawyer and then as a Legal Advisor in the Magistrates Court advising lay Magistrates’ on the law practice and procedure in the Court room. After leaving the Court Service she joined a large national law practice where for a number of years she practiced as a private client specialist.
For the last 5 years she has built a portfolio career where she sits as a decision maker for bodies such as the Ministry of Defence and National Health Service. She also works in the Regulatory sector sitting as a Legal Assessor or member of fitness to practice committees for Regulators such as the ACCA and ICAEW. Victoria has considerable experience of recruitment appointing senior lawyers as well as appointing senior leaders in the education field.
Brandon Horwitz
Brandon is a Principal Consultant at NomBon Consulting, a boutique management consultancy. He is also a Non-Executive Director of London & Colonial Assurance, an insurance company providing flexible annuities, and Options Corporate Pensions UK, a workplace pension provider and pension administrator.
Brandon’s previous roles include launching the Vitality Invest proposition and being responsibility for HSBC UK’s regulated financial advice proposition and conduct risk management for wealth management products. He has also worked as an asset management Technical Specialist at the FSA (now the FCA), as an Investment Banker and Portfolio Manager at Morgan Stanley and in investment consulting at Watson Wyatt (now Willis Towers Watson).
Brandon is a qualified actuary and holds a M.Sc. in Finance and Economics from the London School of Economics as well as a B.Sc. (Honours) in Actuarial Science/Maths of Finance from WITS university.
Brandon’s was also chair of the Institute & Faculty of Actuaries Finance & Investment Board from 2014-2016 as well being a Board member since 2009.
Brandon has also been a Trustee and Non-Executive Director of a charity which helps unemployed people build confidence and skills to find work and of a hospital school for young people with severe eating disorders.
Gary Dixon
Gary trained as a Chartered Accountant with Coopers & Lybrand before joining the banking and pensions focused financial services group, Pointon York, in 1994. In 2000 he formed the Compliance Solutions group which provided regulatory consultancy and risk advisory services to financial services regulated firms. Following the sale of this group in 2007 to a global plc, Gary took on Non-Executive Director roles at a number of regulated firms such as Melton Mowbray Building Society, Guarantee Protection Insurance Ltd and Embark Group plc amongst others.
In addition to his role at the FRC, Gary is a Non-Executive Director at Universities Superannuation Scheme Limited, the UK’s largest funded pension scheme with assets of c. £70Billion where he Chairs the Audit Committee and sits on Remco.
Gary is also a Non-Executive Director of the Church of England’s CBF Funds Trustee Limited which is responsible for six ethical investment funds worth almost £3Bn in aggregate.
Gary is the Chair of Council at the University of Leicester having served as a Lay Member of Council since 2009. He is also a Trustee and Vice Chair of Leicester Theatre Trust which runs Curve Theatre in Leicester as well as being a Trustee of the charity Malawi Foster Care.
He is a Fellow of the ICAEW and holds an MBA from Warwick Business School.
Akbar Khan
Akbar Khan is the immediate former Secretary General of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Headquarters, one of the oldest established organisations in the Commonwealth hosted at Westminster.
Following graduation from the University of Cambridge (Jesus College) and University of Reading (UK), he qualified as a Barrister-at-Law (1990) and subsequently as an Attorney-at-Law at the New York Bar in 2000 (USA). Mr Khan practised at the English Bar for many years and subsequently worked in the fields of international law and human rights for the United Nations Organisation in Geneva and the Middle East before joining Her Majesty’s Diplomatic Service where he held several senior diplomatic positions, including as Head of International Law at the British Embassy, The Hague representing British legal interests before the International Courts and United Nations Tribunals. He has also served as Director of Legal Affairs at the Commonwealth Secretariat. In 2012, he led the high-level Commonwealth fact-finding mission to the Republic of the Maldives to establish the circumstances behind the transfer of executive power following an alleged political coup.
Mr Khan is presently a Legally Qualified Chairperson for several regulatory bodies and Head of Judiciary for the International Rugby League (IRL).