The Governor-General, on the recommendation of the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, appoints Commission members for their knowledge of, and experience in, areas relevant to the Commission's interests. The Telecommunications Commissioner is appointed on the recommendation of the Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media​.

John SmallDr John Small

Chair

Dr John Small was appointed Chair in December 2022, and has been a Commissioner since June 2020. John is the Founding Director of economic consultancy firm, Covec, and was also the former Head of the University of Auckland's Economics Department. He has an extensive experience undertaking complex competition analysis in a wide range of sectors, including energy, transport, agriculture, telecommunications, payment systems, and construction. John was also previously a lay member of the High Court of New Zealand, frequently called as an expert witness before courts, tribunals and commissions. In May 2024 John was appointed as an Associate Member of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Anne Callinan

Deputy Chair

Anne Callinan was appointed as Deputy Chair in 2023. Anne is a commercial litigation lawyer with deep experience of competition and regulatory law. Prior to joining the Commission she worked for Simpson Grierson – becoming a Partner in 1997 and finally the firm’s Chair in 2018. She has a BA/LLB from the University of Auckland.

Pierre van Heerden

Grocery Commissioner

Pierre van Heerden was appointed Grocery Commissioner in July 2023. Most recently, he was the Chief Executive Officer of Mojo Coffee, General Manager Commercial Development of Zealandia, and Executive General Manager of Farrah’s Breads. Prior to this, van Heerden was Managing Director of Southern Sky Associates, a business consultancy. He has also been the Chief Executive Officer of Brancourts Dairy Group, Australia and Executive General Manager of Sanitarium Health and Wellbeing New Zealand for 10 years, Managing Director of Dick Smith Foods in Australia, as well as having held various executive roles with Sanitarium in Australia.

Pierre has also held roles as Chair and Deputy Chair of the Food and Grocery Council of New Zealand, New Zealand Representative of APEC’s Policy Partnership on Food Security, a member of expert advisory groups – Front of Pack Labelling as well as Health Star Rating advisory groups (on behalf of the Minister of Food Safety), and industry advisor on the Food and Beverage Information project. He has also been Chair of Life Health Foods Limited and director of New Zealand Health Association Limited, SoSoy (Pty) Ltd and the International Health Food Association. He is well educated with recent studies at both London Business School and INSEAD on a Prime Minister’s Business Scholarship. He holds various other qualifications including BBA, Hons BCom, Hons BCompt, MBL, is a qualified Chartered Accountant, FCPA, MInstD, and GAICD.

Tristan Gilbertson

Telecommunications Commissioner

Tristan Gilbertson was appointed Telecommunications Commissioner in June 2020. He is a corporate and commercial lawyer with extensive international experience in telecommunications law and regulation. After an early career in private practice, Tristan was appointed Legal & Regulatory Director – Asia-Pacific at Vodafone Group Plc, where he was closely involved in the expansion and diversification of Vodafone’s business. He then joined Telecom New Zealand Ltd where he was Group General Counsel and played a leading role in the structural separation of Telecom and the re-set of the regulatory framework. Most recently, he was Group General Counsel of Digicel Group Ltd, where he focused on transformation and change across Digicel’s 32 global markets. Tristan holds a BA/LLB(Hons) from the University of Auckland and has completed the Executive Leadership Development Programme at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Bryan Chapple

Commissioner

Bryan Chapple is an experienced economist and senior public sector leader, with a deep understanding of the Aotearoa New Zealand economy and the role of regulation. He was Deputy Secretary (Growth and Macroeconomics) at the New Zealand Treasury from 2017 until joining the Commission in 2022. In that role, Bryan led the Treasury’s work on micro- and macro-economic policy, including regulatory strategy.

Dr Derek Johnston

Commissioner

A commercial lawyer, Derek has extensive experience and knowledge of competition law coupled with significant mergers and transactional experience and familiarity with many of the regulated sectors. His past roles include being the independent Chair of NZX’s Regulatory Governance Committee and the Chair of the NZ Markets Disciplinary Tribunal. For many years Derek was a corporate partner with Russell McVeagh and most recently has been practising as a barrister and arbitrator at Thorndon Chambers. In December 2022, Derek was appointed as an Associate Member of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission until October 2024.

Derek holds undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in law from the University of Auckland and a doctorate in law from the University of Toronto.

Vhari McWha

Commissioner

Vhari McWha was appointed as an Associate Commissioner in 2020 and a Commissioner in July 2023. Vhari is an experienced economist and has advised on public policy and regulation, including competition analysis and market design. She has a background in quantitative analysis, including cost benefit, modelling and forecasting work. Vhari has specific expertise in the energy sector. Prior to joining the Commission, Vhari was a Director at Sapere. Her earlier roles include Deputy Director at the economic consultancy NZIER and Regulatory Affairs Manager at Meridian Energy. Vhari holds an MCom (Hons) in economics from the University of Canterbury.

Joseph Liava’a

Associate Commissioner

Joseph Liava’a was appointed as an Associate Commissioner in April 2019. Prior to joining the Commission, Joseph worked as the Community Liaison Manager for Nirvana Health Group. Before that he was a consumer law advisor for the former Ministry of Consumer Affairs and also worked as a private secretary for the Minister. Joseph has also given consumer law training to budget advice services and community law centres. He has been involved with a variety of boards and panels, including Pacific Health and Welfare Inc, Vaiola Pacific Island Budgeting Service Trust (Mangere), Otara Health Charitable Trust, as well as the board of Consumer New Zealand.

Loretta Lovell

Associate Commissioner

Loretta Lovell is a Solicitor, Independent Environmental Commissioner and Professional Director.

For over 20 years Loretta has specialised in public, commercial, energy and resource management law, advising clients as they develop their resources and negotiate and progress large scale infrastructure projects. As an environmental commissioner and chairperson, she has considered and decided many complex plan and consent applications often involving large scale infrastructure for telecommunications, electricity grid, lines and generation, and drinking, storm and wastewater.

Loretta is also a Board member of the Independent Crown Regulator Taumata Arowai which regulates water quality for New Zealand, providing a common conduit between the economic and quality regulators at governance level. She is also a Board member of The Charities Registration Board and until recently served on the board of the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority and the Environmental Legal Assistance Advisory Panel.

Nathan StrongNathan Strong

Associate Commissioner

Nathan Strong is a qualified economist, with over 20 years of experience focusing on applied competition and regulatory economics, including at senior management levels in regulated companies. He was the General Manager (Commercial) at Unison Networks having first been appointed to the executive team at Unison in 2010. Nathan was also the Chair of the Electricity Networks Associations’ Regulatory Working Group, a Member of the Electricity Authority’s Security and Reliability Council and had previously been a member of several Electricity Authority Advisory Groups

Rakihia Tau

Associate Commissioner

Rakihia has held a range of senior executive and governance positions in both the public and private sectors. Most recently he was Group Head - Strategic Relationships at Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu in Christchurch. He also has served as Chair of the State Owned Enterprise AgriQuality, a director of Ngāi Tahu Properties Ltd and was one of the principal negotiators of the Ngāi Tahu Claim. He currently chairs the boards of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust and Te Tauraki Limited. He is a Partner of consultancy firm IHIA Ltd.

Rakihia originally qualified as a Marine Engineer, before obtaining a BCom and MBA from the University of Canterbury.

Anna Brakey

Associate Commissioner

Anna Brakey was appointed a Commissioner of the ACCC in December 2020. She is also an Associate Member of the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

Anna Brakey has extensive experience in regulatory economics and public policy with over 25 years of experience working with regulators, government and within the private sector. She has had broad exposure to a wide range of infrastructure industries, including energy, water and transport. Additionally, she has worked on economic reform to social policy.

Prior to starting at ACCC, Anna worked as an economist at Frontier Economics and held a number of roles at the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART), including being a deputy Tribunal Member, the Executive Director of Strategy and Economic Analysis and the Chief Operating Officer. Anna’s expertise includes the Parliamentary Committee process, the New South Wales Department of Transport, the Australian Productivity Commission, the Bureau of Industry Economics and the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Additionally, Anna has worked for the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) on reforms to economic regulation and with the New South Wales Treasury on the sale of assets.

Anna chairs the ACCC’s Infrastructure Committee, Communications Committee, Electricity Markets Inquiry Board and East Coast Gas Market Board, and is a member of the ACCC’s Competition Exemptions Committee and Agriculture Board.

Anna holds a Bachelor of Economics from Australian National University and a Graduate Diploma of Applied Finance and Investment from Securities Institute of Australia. She is also a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Stephen RidgewayStephen Ridgeway

Associate Commissioner

Stephen Ridgeway was appointed a Commissioner of the ACCC in June 2019. Stephen brings a wealth of experience from his previous roles as a lawyer in the private and public sectors. He is widely recognised as one of Australia’s leading competition and consumer lawyers and an expert in the field. In 2018 Stephen retired as a senior partner at King & Wood Mallesons.

Early in his career, Stephen acted for the ACCC and its predecessor, the Trade Practices Commission, in enforcement litigation as a senior lawyer with the Australian Government Solicitor. Since joining private practice in 1998, Stephen has had extensive involvement in merger clearance applications in a wide variety of industries, including energy and telecommunications. He also has extensive experience in regulatory enforcement actions, including a number of landmark ACCC enforcement matters in recent years.

During 2011 and 2012 Stephen was National Chairman of the Competition and Consumer Committee of the Law Council of Australia, and led consultations with the ACCC and Treasury about policy and enforcement matters. He was a member of the Executive Committee of the Business Law Section of the Law Council of Australia from 2016 to 2018.

Stephen chairs the ACCC’s Mergers Review and Competition Exemptions Committees, and is a member of the ACCC’s Enforcement Committee, Communications Committee and Agriculture Board.

Stephen holds a Bachelor of Science (Honours) from the University of New South Wales and a Bachelor of Laws from the Australian National University.