Speakers
Garry Best
President and CEO, Nunatsiavut Group of Companies (NGC)
Garry Best is a Beneficiary of the Nunatsiavut Land Claim Agreement and the President and CEO of the Nunatsiavut Group of Companies (NGC). Prior to this role, Garry served as Board Chair of the Labrador Inuit Capital Strategy Trust. Garry holds a Bachelor of Engineering from Memorial University and a Postgraduate Diploma in Naval Architecture from University College London, UK. His career includes over 23 years as an officer in the Royal Canadian Navy and 17 years as an executive in the Federal Public Service.
Garry has extensive experience in leadership, strategic planning, and Indigenous-government relations. He has held senior roles such as Regional Executive for the Ontario First Nations and Inuit Health Branch and National Director of Land Administration. Garry is committed to community service, having contributed to Indigenous education programs and executive recruitment. His achievements have been recognized with awards including the Deputy Minister Award for leadership in First Nations Infrastructure and the DND Diversity Award.
April Hayward, Ph.D., MBA
Chief Sustainability Officer, Li-FT Power Ltd.
Dr. April Hayward leads the environment, permitting, engagement, and corporate social responsibility programs for Li-FT Power Ltd. – a Canadian critical minerals exploration company with assets in the Northwest Territories and Quebec. April has over 25 years of experience working in the fields of environment and sustainability in the academic, public, and private sectors. For more than a decade, Dr. Hayward’s career has been dedicated to developing collaborative relationships between industry, Indigenous communities, regulatory agencies, and academic researchers to advance sustainable development in the mining industry in northern Canada. April has a Ph.D. in ecology from McMaster University (2007) and an MBA from the Haskayne School of Business (2022).
Lisa Mitchell
President and CEO of the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships
Lisa Mitchell is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships (CCPPP), a national, member-driven organization that brings together leaders from all orders of government and the private sector to shape the future of Canada’s infrastructure. Under her leadership, the Council is advancing national dialogue on how innovative partnerships and delivery models can help build resilient, sustainable, and high-performing infrastructure across the country.
With more than 20 years of experience in leadership, communications, and public affairs—and over a decade dedicated to advancing public-private partnerships—Lisa has helped shape Canada’s modern infrastructure agenda. Before joining the Council, she served as Senior Director, Investments, Partnerships and Innovation at Infrastructure Canada, and as Director, Strategy and Market Development at PPP Canada Inc., where she led corporate strategy, policy, and communications for the federal Crown corporation.
An advocate for Canada’s P3 model and market, Lisa has spearheaded major research and policy initiatives positioning Canada as a global leader in infrastructure delivery. She is a recognized voice both nationally and internationally and is the former Chair of the OECD’s Network of Senior PPP and Infrastructure Officials, where she worked with global counterparts to share best practices and strengthen public investment frameworks worldwide.
Madeleine Redfern, LL.B.
Executive Director, Northern Branch, Arctic360
Madeleine Redfern is an Indigenous woman involved in high-tech and innovation. Actively involved in transformative technologies in telecommunications, transportation and energy.
Currently Madeleine is the President of Amautiit: Nunavut Inuit Women’s Association, President of Ajungi Consulting Group; Chair of Nunavut Legal Services Board; Advisor to Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, Trudeau Foundation Board Member (former Trudeau Foundation Mentor); Co-Chair with Gordon Munk Arctic Security Program; Board member of Maliiganik Legal Aid. Madeleine is from Iqaluit, Nunavut and a graduate of the Akitsiraq Law School with an LLB from the University of Victoria. She was the first Inuk to be given a Supreme Court of Canada clerkship.
As a businesswoman and a strong social advocate for transformative initiatives, Madeleine has a great deal of governance and volunteer experience with Indigenous and Inuit organizations, including, but not limited to, Inuit Non-Profit Housing Corporation; Tungasuvvingat Inuit Community Centre, and one of the founding members of Wabano Aboriginal Health Centre and Inuit Head Start in Ottawa. Madeleine was also the executive director of the Qikiqtani Truth Commission, a commission that reviewed the “effects of federal government policies on Eastern Arctic Inuit” between the 1950s and 1980s.
Madeleine’s advocacy, professional, and governance work shown my dedication and passion towards the development and delivery of programs assisting Indigenous, Inuit, northerners and Canadians that reflect their values, needs, and priorities. Madeleine received the Indspire Award for Public Service to acknowledge and celebrate all her hard work, commitment and contributions.
Claude Véron-Réville
EU Special Envoy for Arctic Matters,
Head of Division for Western Europe, European External Action Service
Claude Véron-Réville is since September 2024 the Special Envoy for Arctic matters. She heads at the same time the European External Action Service’s division for Western Europe, Arctic and Regional matters, which Prior to that, she occupied different managerial positions in the EEAS Human Resources Department and was notably in charge of the selection and recruitment of EEAS staff. Previously, she worked several years on the Eastern Europe and Russia files as Deputy Head of the Russia Division in the EEAS and Deputy Head of Division for Eastern Partnership, the OSCE and Regional Organisations, including the Northern Dimension and BEAC. Between November 2011 and August 2013 she was posted as a European exchange diplomat (Transatlantic Diplomatic Fellow) in the US State Department in the Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova Office and in the Russia Office. Claude holds a Master’s Degree from the College of Europe and graduated from the Paris Institute of Political Sciences. Her mother tongue is French and she speaks English and Russian.
Dr. Jessica M. Shadian, Ph.D.
President and CEO, Arctic360
Her expertise is regularly solicited by media organisations, governments, the private sector, academia, and think tanks. Shadian’s 2014 book: The Politics of Arctic Sovereignty: Oil, Ice, and Inuit Governance (Routledge) is the first in-depth history of the Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC) and Inuit sovereignty in global politics reaching back to pre-European discovery. Her consulting work began while living in the Norwegian Arctic as the co-creator and organizer of an Arctic Dialogue series that brought together state and local political and industry leaders, local and Indigenous communities, and academia to increase information sharing about Arctic resource development.
Dr. Shadian holds a Ph.D. in Global Governance from the University of Delaware (2006) during which she wrote her doctoral dissertation at the Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI), University of Cambridge, UK on an NSF award. She spent the following 5 years in Norway at the Barents Institute and then as a Senior Researcher at the High North Center for Business and Governance, Nord University, Bodø after which she was awarded an Associate Professor, Marie Curie COFUND Fellowship, at the Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies (AIAS), Denmark. In June 2017, Shadian completed a two-year Nansen Professorship co-funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the University of Akureyri, Iceland after which she turned to dedicate herself full-time to build Arctic360.
Shadian lives in Toronto with her husband and two children.
Rob Tinline
British High Commissioner to Canada
Rob Tinline has been British High Commissioner to Canada since February 2025. He represents the British Government in Canada and oversees the High Commission in Ottawa and Consulates in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary.
He is a career diplomat. Prior to arriving in Canada, he was Director Americas at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office from May 2022 to January 2025, advising on policy and overseeing the UK diplomatic network across the region. Before that he worked on the response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, having been Director for COVID-19 from 2020 to 2022 and Chief of the Assessments Staff for the Joint Intelligence Committee from 2017 to 2019. He was the founding head of the UK Government Counter Proliferation and Arms Control Centre. His overseas postings have included to British Embassies in Bogota and Madrid, to the UK Mission to the UN in New York, as Head of the Multinational Provincial Reconstruction Team in Basra, and as Deputy Head of Mission at the (then) UK Permanent Representation to the European Union in Brussels.
Genevieve Tuts
EU Ambassador to Canada
Genevieve Tuts began her tenure at the helm of the Delegation of the European Union to Canada in September 2024. She has extensive experience gained in several EU institutions, the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the legal profession. She served as the Head of Cabinet for European Commissioner for Justice between December 2019 and August 2024.The portfolio included Justice, Rule of law, data protection, and consumer law.
Ambassador Tuts started her career as a lawyer specializing in EU law before becoming a magistrate with the Belgian Ministry of Justice. In 2002, she transitioned to the cabinet of the Belgian Minister for Foreign Affairs, where she held key roles focused on European and external policies. As Belgium’s Representative in COREPER I in the EU Council of Ministers, she addressed a wide range of EU policies, including energy, environment, climate, and digital. She also served 13 years as Director in the Council of Ministers, leading the work of 3 Directorates: Transport, Telecom, Energy- inter institutional affairs and Legal service’s Directorate Quality of legislation.
The Ambassador holds a Master’s in European Law and a Law degree. She has been an assistant at Liege University at the law faculty and Master of Conference at ENA. She speaks French, English, and Dutch. She has practised improvisational acting and has a deep appreciation for diverse music genres, playing both piano and guitar. Passionate by cinema she is also an outdoor enthusiast, she enjoys running along rivers, lakes, and coastlines.
As the EU Ambassador to Canada, Geneviève Tuts leads the EU Delegation in its work to strengthen ties between the European Union and
Ollie Williams
Editor, Cabin Radio
Ollie Williams is the editor of Cabin Radio, a newsroom based in Yellowknife that serves Canada’s Northwest Territories. He and four other Yellowknife residents founded Cabin Radio in 2017. Previously, Ollie was a senior broadcast journalist for the BBC based in London and Manchester, England, and volunteered with youth in the Northwest Territories hamlet of Fort Liard.
Strengthening the
North American Arctic
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