OPERA Founders Award 2026 awarded to John Munnings-Tomes

Jan 30

As previously communicated to members the Founders’ Award (formerly Tom Redmond Award) has been relaunched with nominations invited from the membership for individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to insurance risk engineering. This is now a two-yearly award judged by a subgroup of the OPERA committee with the winner receiving the Founders’ Award trophy and a £250 donation to a charity of their choice.

All OPERA presenters from the previous two years were considered and voted on by the committee and although difficult to compare there were two or three stand out presentations which were judged alongside the individual membership nominations. Those membership nominations were:

Tom Anthoni (Aon) and Nigel Cairns (Liberty) for their work in developing and promoting a process safety barrier-based approach to a survey report to enable visibility of barrier health and focus on the key process safety elements important to underwriters.

John Munnings-Tomes (The Hartford) for his particular contributions to offshore risk engineering as a driving force behind FORE (Forum of Offshore Risk Engineers) and similarly extensive contributions to the JNRC (Joint Natural Resources Committee) with multiple publications issued to the market over the years. John has also contributed to a number of other insurance market committees and forums and is a passionate supporter of educational STEM initiatives.

Ian Roy (Marsh) who has led the Marsh risk engineering team in the Middle East for many years and has made significant contributions to numerous aspects of risk engineering services including the development of the ‘deep dive’ concept in response to insurance market requests for more detailed investigation of loss driving topics.

After due consideration John Munnings-Tomes was named as the winner for 2026 and received the trophy during the OPERA AGM in the Lloyd’s Library on 21st January. Congratulations go to John and £250 has been donated to his charity of choice. Recognition should also go to his fellow nominees and to all the OPERA presenters who contributed over the last two years.