Making an objective and informed assessment of each candidate against the specific nomination criteria means that drawing together the right panel of judges is of critical importance. The group that has been assembled combines a broad range of professional experience, political balance, and diversity. The judging panel approach the difficult and important task of agreeing a shortlist and then a winner, with utter professionalism, insight and most importantly, an open mind.
Ali Miraj
Chairman
Ali Miraj
Ali Miraj is a broadcaster, infrastructure financier and DJ. He presents shows on LBC and regularly appears on other outlets including Sky News, Channel 5 and Good Morning Britain to comment on domestic political developments and international affairs.
In 2012, he founded the Contrarian Prize to recognise the independence, courage and sacrifice of British public figures whose ideas challenge the status quo. He is a former Conservative parliamentary candidate and was first elected as a councillor at the age of 23. He also served as an adviser to the Conservative Foreign Affairs Team from 2001-2003 and a board member of the Party’s policy commissions on quality of life and international and national security (2006-2007).
Having qualified as a chartered accountant, he is a Managing Director at ING responsible for global coverage of infrastructure equity funds for the bank. Ali is a trained house music DJ and has had multiple residencies and played at leading venues around the world. He is national vice president of CPRE, the countryside charity and a liveryman of the Worshipful Company of International Bankers.
Vicky Pryce
Professor Vicky Pryce is a board member of the Centre for Economics and Business Research and sits on the Economic Advisory Group of the British Chambers of Commerce and on the advisory board of OMFIF, the central banking think tank. She was previously senior managing director at FTI Consulting, director-general for Economics at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and deputy and then joint head of the UK Government’s Economic Service at the time of the Stern climate change review.
Before that, she was a partner at KPMG and held senior economic positions in banking and the oil sector. She has held a number of academic posts and is a fellow and council member of the Academy of Social Sciences, a companion of the British Academy of Management and a fellow of the Society of Business Economists. She is also co-founder of GoodCorporation, a company set up to advise on corporate social responsibility, including on the environmental impact of business.
Michael Woodford
Michael spent the next 30 years of his professional life working at Olympus. In April 2011, he was appointed President of the Olympus Corporation - the first Western 'salary-man' to rise through the ranks to the top of a Japanese giant. That October he was also made CEO, but only two weeks later was dismissed after querying inexplicable payments approaching $2 billion.
After his bravery at Olympus, The Sunday Times, The Independent, the Financial Times and The Sun, all awarded him the 2011/12 ‘Business Person of the Year’. Michael was also the winner of the ‘Association of Certified Fraud Examiners award’ “For Choosing Truth Over Self”, and in 2013 was the recipient of the inaugural Contrarian Prize.
In 2014, Michael was awarded the International Chamber of Commerce’s special award for “displaying courage and a sense of deep conviction towards the highest principles of corporate governance”. In May of 2015, at the Foreign Correspondent's Club of Japan he received the “Friend of the Free Press” award.
Michael has chronicled his unbelievable story in his bestseller true life thriller ‘Exposure: Inside the Olympus Scandal: How I Went from CEO to Whistleblower’. He now spends his life writing and lecturing on business culture, and the frailties of human nature in the workplace.
Izabella Kaminska
Izabella Kaminska is a senior editor for POLITICO. She formerly was a journalist at the Financial Times and was the editor of FT Alphaville. Prior to that, she worked as a producer at CNBC, a natural gas reporter at Platts and an associate editor of BP’s internal magazine. She has also worked as a reporter on English language business papers in Poland and Azerbaijan and was a Reuters graduate trainee in 2004.
Everything she knows about economics stems from a childhood fascination with ancient economies, specifically the agrarian land reforms of the early Roman republic and the coinage and price stability reforms of late Roman emperors. Her favourite emperor is one Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletian. She studied Ancient History at UCL and has a masters in Journalism from what was then the London College of Printing.
Gawain Towler
Gawain was the Head of Press for UKIP between 2009 and 2018 as the party went from being a statistical anomaly to becoming a significant force in British politics, first winning the European elections in 2014, forcing the Cameron Government to offer a referendum, then being a significant part of the winning Leave campaign. Previous to that he worked in the European Parliament in Brussels and Strasbourg as an advisor on International Development and Humanitarian Aid.
He was 'Brussels Sprouts' for Private Eye and founded and edited the EU focussed satirical and investigative magazine, The Sprout. He is a regular columnist in the New European and regularly writes for a range of other publications and runs his own PR firm, CWC Strategy.
