Christopher Hannon

Chris Hannon has a career spanning more than 35 years in the operation and management of company pension schemes across several industries. Before entering the rail sector he held management and trustee-support roles with private-sector employers including Safeway Supermarkets plc and the Thomas Cook Group. In 2004 he joined the rail industry as Head of Pensions at Network Rail, where for around 12 years he was responsible for the operator's defined-benefit and defined-contribution pension arrangements.

He later became Pensions Director for the UK and European companies of Genesee & Wyoming Inc., the US-headquartered freight-rail operator whose UK business includes Freightliner. In parallel, Hannon built a long tenure inside the governance of the Railways Pension Scheme (RPS): he was appointed a Trustee Director in 2005, and from 2007 chaired the Trustee's Integrated Funding Committee and its predecessor, the Benefits and Funding Committee. In January 2016 he was appointed a Non-Executive Director of RPMI (Railpen).

On 19 March 2019, following a unanimous board vote, Hannon became Chair of the Trustee Board of the Railways Pension Trustee Company, succeeding John Chilman (who moved to become CEO of RPMI Railpen). As chair he oversaw the stewardship of the RPS, of RPMI Railpen (the in-house investment manager) and of the scheme's pension-administration business — a scheme reported at the time at roughly £29bn (later £34bn+) covering the UK rail industry. He retired as Trustee Chair on 6 July 2022, having "served on the Board for the past 17 years," and was succeeded by Christine Kernoghan.

• Institutional asset owner, not an angel. Hannon's "investing" is in the governance and fiduciary-oversight sense: as Trustee Chair he was ultimately accountable for how Railpen allocated a multi-billion-pound, multi-employer pension scheme across public and private markets on a long-term, liability-driven basis. There is no evidence of a personal cheque-writing angel practice.
• Funding and liability focus. His committee record — chairing the Integrated Funding Committee and the earlier Benefits and Funding Committee from 2007 — signals a specialism in scheme funding, covenant, and de-risking rather than growth-equity or venture selection.
• Responsible / sustainable investment. Railpen under his chairmanship was a prominent UK advocate of responsible investment and active stewardship; the scheme's public positioning emphasised long-horizon, sustainability-aware allocation and member outcomes.
• Sector expertise: rail and transport pensions governance — the throughline of his entire career (Network Rail, Genesee & Wyoming/Freightliner, RPS).