John has been a Non-Executive Director since 1984 and is an economist and lawyer. He is the current Executive Chairman of Seawick Pty Ltd.

Previously, John was one of the most senior executives at BHP (BHP).   His role included central involvement in the development and implementation of the strategy that resulted in the reconstruction and repositioning of BHP as the world’s leading diversified resources company and with the major transactions that gave effect to that strategy. He was BHP’s Chief Legal Counsel and Head of External Affairs (with overall group responsibility for BHP’s worldwide political and country risk), and a member of the Office of Chief Executive, its most senior management committee as well as its Investment Review Committee.

Before joining BHP, John was the senior commercial partner specialising in mergers and acquisitions at the law firm Arnold Bloch Leibler. John is a former member of the Australian Government’s Takeovers Panel and consults to a number of private and public companies on country and political risk, governance, succession and strategy.

He is a Non-Executive Director of ESL Support Pty Ltd, BT Assurance Systems (Aust) Pty Ltd, Learning Base Pty Ltd and The Development Studio Pty Ltd.

He is Deputy Chair of the Advisory Board to the Centre for Legal and Regulatory Studies (CLARS) at the Faculty of Law at Monash University.

He was formerly the founding Chairman of National Indigenous Education Foundation Ltd, and a former Non-Executive Director of The Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, Investa Listed Funds Management Limited, and of The Gandel Group Pty Ltd.