Shortlisted nominees 2026

Daniel is a Senior Enforcement Advocate at the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), where he leads the organisation's in-house advocacy team. His career has been defined by a commitment to public service and the protection of people and places through the law. 
 
While serving in the Royal Navy, Daniel was selected by Navy Legal Services for legal training and was called to the Bar in 2011. He went on to serve in a range of legal appointments before leaving the Armed Forces in 2019. Continuing his public service, he joined the Equality and Human Rights Commission, advising on high-profile and politically sensitive investigations. A subsequent role as Legal Director within a City corporation broadened his understanding of the commercial realities and regulatory challenges faced by industry. 
 
Returning to public service with the HSE, Daniel established and now leads its first in-house advocacy team. Under his leadership, the team prosecutes complex health and safety cases across England and Wales, working alongside colleagues to make key charging decisions and deliver high-quality legal advocacy. The creation of HSE’s own in-house advocacy team has strengthened its enforcement capability and advanced its vital mission of keeping people and places safe. 

Aliya Rashid is a highly experienced criminal barrister with 32 years in practice, including 28 years with the CPS and 20 years as a Crown Advocate. 

A specialist in rape and serious sexual offences, she has dedicated much of her career to securing justice for victims of some of the most serious and complex crimes. She has prosecuted some of the most significant cases in England and Wales, including the Telford 9 grooming gang prosecution, the prosecution of the oldest convicted sex offender in UK history, aged 101, and the murder of Daniel Pelka. Her contributions in the latter case led to her becoming the first CPS prosecutor to receive the coveted Red Bag. 

Aliya has also served as an Assistant Coroner for Luton and Bedfordshire, reflecting the breadth of her experience across the criminal justice system. 

For 19 years, Aliya has been one of the CPS's leading voices on honour-based abuse, shaping understanding of these offences across the courts, communities and wider criminal justice system. She has trained prosecutors, judges, charities and community organisations, challenging misconceptions surrounding honour-based abuse, forced marriage and violence against women and girls. Given her longstanding leadership in this field, it was no surprise that she formed part of the prosecution team in the first forced marriage trial in the West Midlands and only the second in the country. 

Beyond the courtroom, she played a significant role in public education through a series of Sky TV lectures examining the role of women, domestic abuse, forced versus arranged marriage and FGM. Through this work, she helped distinguish legal, cultural and religious perspectives, promoting informed discussion on issues often misunderstood or misrepresented. This year, she authored the CPS's first HBA training brief following the introduction of the new statutory definition of honour-based abuse, drawing on her work with national scrutiny panels and stakeholder groups to ensure prosecutors across England and Wales are equipped to respond effectively to this developing area of law. 

Today, Aliya is a National Legal Trainer for the CPS, developing lawyers at every stage of their careers, from Trainees to Principal Crown Advocates. As a Visiting Lecturer with the Inns of Court College of Advocacy and ICCA International, she delivers criminal advocacy and RASSO training to barristers in the UK and overseas. She is also co-authoring the Inns of Court College of Advocacy's RASSO programme, helping to align advocacy standards across the employed and self-employed Bar. 

Passionate about widening access to the Bar, Aliya works with schools, universities and aspiring lawyers from under-represented backgrounds. As an Asian woman at the Bar, she recognises the importance of visibility and representation and is committed to opening doors for the next generation of advocates. 

Over more than three decades in practice, Aliya has dedicated her career to public service, professional leadership and an unwavering commitment to leave the profession stronger than she found it.

Aimee Stokes is a Senior Associate Barrister in the Regulatory and Public Law team at Mills & Reeve LLP. She advises and represents organisations and individuals facing regulatory investigations and enforcement action, from initial incident response and investigation through to prosecution and sentencing. 

Aimee acts in matters involving a wide range of regulators, including the Health and Safety Executive, Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales, Companies House, Trading Standards and HMRC, and also represents clients in private prosecutions. 

Before joining Mills & Reeve, Aimee was a Senior Crown Prosecutor in the Crown Prosecution Service's Homicide and Crown Court Units and practised at the independent Bar. She has also undertaken secondments with the Financial Conduct Authority and the Nursing and Midwifery Council. 

Aarti Thakor is a civil law barrister, accredited mediator and Partner. Until April 2024, she was the Director of Legal and Accountancy Services (Chief Legal Officer) at the Charity Commission for England and Wales, where she led the regulator’s most significant and sensitive cases, investigations, legislative changes and policy work. She is widely regarded as one of the UK’s leading charity and regulatory lawyers, with over 20 years’ specialist experience across domestic and international charity regulation, covering national, state and sector specific issues. 

Aarti now leads the firm’s consultancy, investigations and regulatory review work for major international NGOs, governments, philanthropic foundations, international institutions and charities, advising on complex, high profile regulatory matters for a range of UK and global organisations. 

During her tenure at the Charity Commission, Aarti oversaw all of the regulator’s most high profile, complex and sensitive national cases, regulatory strategies and risk assessments. She led major policy and legislative projects, including contributing to the development and implementation of the Charities Acts 2016 and 2022 and providing written and oral evidence to Parliamentary Committees. 

She also has advised governments globally on the development and reform of NGO regulatory systems, to ensure greater transparency and accountability for the benefit of civil society. She has extensive experience in FATF Recommendation 8, AML and CTF standards, and is currently an expert legal adviser to the EU funded Global Facility on AML/CTF, supporting governments on legislative, risk and operational reforms to NGO regulation. 

Sarah Williams is a Band 1-ranked family lawyer in Chambers & Partners, a Partner in the Family team and Head of Children at Forsters. Sarah spent the first half of her career at the self-employed bar at 18 St John Street, Manchester specialising in Family law, representing parents, guardians, local authorities, the Official Solicitor and the Attorney General. After relocating to London and starting her family, Sarah shifted to the employed Bar, working in top tier firms advising on HNW, high-profile, complex and sensitive family law matters.  

Sarah sits on the National Committee and the International Committee of the Bar Council of England & Wales, the National Committee of the Family Law Bar Association and the Employed Bar Forum of Inner Temple. In addition to being influential at policy level, Sarah has a remarkable pro bono practice, bringing her expertise to those without means in landmark cases concerning international surrogacy, gender issues, super donors and parentage and guidelines for vulnerable witnesses in family proceedings. Sarah represents the face of the modern employed Bar as a practitioner, contributor and commentator and is recognised as one of the foremost practitioners of her field. 

The Government Legal Department – AI Legal Centre of Excellence is the cross-government network for AI legal expertise, equipping government lawyers with the knowledge and confidence to advise on the rapidly evolving legal implications of artificial intelligence. 

Since 2025, the team has become the hub for AI legal capability across government, connecting specialists, driving knowledge sharing, and fostering a coordinated approach to emerging legal issues. Its work includes a highly rated intensive AI legal training programme attended by hundreds of government lawyers, and the AI Legal Cell, a regular forum bringing together specialists from across departments to share legal expertise and coordinate approaches.  

Through partnerships with academia, including the University of Oxford, and a strong presence at major professional events, it has built a highly influential network that is strengthening the civil service's ability to respond to AI-driven change and reinforcing GLD's position as a leader in legal innovation. 

BAE Systems plc provides some of the world's most advanced, technology-led defence, aerospace and security solutions. Working with government customers and local partners, we develop, engineer, manufacture and support products and systems to deliver military capability, protect national security and people, and keep critical information and infrastructure secure. 

BAE’s internal 130-strong team of barristers, solicitors, paralegals and solicitor-apprentices operate at pace in an ever-changing regulatory and geopolitical landscape, engaging in work that is high value, highly complex and highly regulated, across UK and international markets and territories. Recognised sector experts, they provide multi-disciplinary advice to each of the businesses or within specialist teams at BAE’s head office. The impact of their work is vast: at the most recent count BAE’s UK operations supported 159,600 jobs and contributed £13.7bn to UK GDP.

Family Rights Group is the leading charity working to ensure children can live safely and thrive in their family, and that children in the care system have loving relationships they can turn to throughout life. Family Rights Group’s legal team has a pivotal role in the charity achieving its strategic goals and its reputation as a leading authority on child welfare law and policy. The team address a range of systemic injustices impacting children and families involved with the child welfare and family justice systems through legal work which: 

• Supports innovation and system change 
• Provides public legal education for practitioners and families 
• Influences government and legal reforms. 

Their recent work has included providing legal analysis and advice for the charity to influence the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill and secure three landmark legal changes; delivering public legal education about Bill; and crafting proposed Bill amendments and briefings for Peers. Current work includes a major legal aid reform proposal to improve access to legal advice and justice for kinship carers.

The Government Legal Department, part of the Cabinet Office Legal Advisers Directorate within the Government Legal Department, advised the Public Sector Fraud Authority (PSFA) on its counter-fraud functions and played a critical role in developing and implementing the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Act. Through this work, the ICF team transformed complex counter-fraud policy into robust, legally compliant frameworks, helping to expand the PSFA's powers to investigate fraud and recover public funds.