Joint Independent Audit Committee

The Joint Independent Audit Committee provides independent assurance to the Police and Crime Commissioner and Chief Constable regarding the adequacy of the risk management framework and the associated control environment within Thames Valley Police and our office.

Members of JIAC are:

• Melissa Strange – Melissa Strange is CFO (Chief Finance Officer) for an early stage company in the life sciences sector, having previously served as Vice President, Finance within a US and coUK listed biotech.  Through her current and prior roles, Melissa has overseen internal controls, risk management and governance practices as well as core financial management and strategy.
• Dr Stephen Page – Dr Stephen Page Stephen is a non-executive director with 18 years risk, growth, governance and strategy experience as a board member in large, complex organisations, both public and private. He has a particular focus on the boardroom issues of the digital age including data stewardship and cyber risk. In his executive career Stephen was the worldwide head of IT/digital strategy and transformation at Accenture and the commercial director of a large global Accenture business.
• Dr Chris Westcott – Chris is Chair of the Science Council’s Finance, Audit and Risk Committee, a member of the Department of Health and Social Care COMARE expert committee, a member of the British Council’s Digital Advisory Group, and a parish councillor. He’s been a non-exec director at an international geopolitical risk analysis and advisory company and at an Open Source research and analysis consultancy spun out from the Policy Institute at Kings College London, an academic visitor at the University of Oxford’s Reuters Institute for the study of Journalism and a Trustee of the Science Council. Chris was previously the Director and Editor-in-Chief of BBC Monitoring for 12 years. Earlier in his career, Chris led the editorial and technological development of BBC World Service’s digital media portfolio and joined its board in 2000 as its first ever Head of Online. He was responsible for a sequence of major investments spanning online and mobile news services in 44 languages, including the BBC’s first 24-hour news services in Arabic, Chinese, Russian, and Spanish. He was the World Service lead for the launch of BBC News Online in 1997.  Prior to his BBC career Chris was a research scientist at the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s labs at Harwell. Chris holds an MA in Metallurgy and Materials Science from the University of Oxford and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Southampton.
• Dr Luca Raffellini – Luca is an Executive Director of Standard & Poor’s (S&P) in London, formerly Vice President of the Financial Services practice of Frost & Sullivan. 28 years in the Energy and Chemical industries, with experience in corporate strategy, due diligence, risk assessment, and business continuity planning for large organisations. He held positions as Global Marketing Manager of a Shell-ExxonMobil joint venture and Senior Principal at Booz & Co (now PwC). He also serves on the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council, chaired the editorial board of Insight magazine, and was on the Business Plan Judging Panel of Oxford University. Luca is a Doctor of Chemistry and an MBA.
• Kay Taylor – Kay Taylor has 25 years’ experience investigating and prosecuting serious financial crime and financial services regulatory breaches. She is now Director of Forensic Accounting in the Financial Reporting Council’s Enforcement Division. She leads a team of forensic accountants investigating the performance of accountants, auditors and their firms in high profile cases such as Carillion and Patisserie Valerie. Kay has spent significant time working alongside police forces on financial crime cases at the Serious Fraud Office and Financial Conduct Authority. She is skilled in risk assessment, management and mitigation; leading professional teams; and evaluating complex financial issues. Alongside her skills and experience, she brings a career-long commitment to public service to her role on the Joint Independent Audit Committee.

Background documents

• Annual Assurance Report 2023
• Joint Independent Audit Committee – Operating Principles December 2019

Agendas and minutes of JIAC