Mike Lea

Mike is a Chartered town planner with more than 20 years’ experience across the public and private sectors. He joined the Department for Education (DfE) in 2016 after starting his career in local government followed by 10 years in planning consultancy. He leads an in-house team of planning professionals working to support the Department’s programmes for new-build and rebuilding across the education estate, and engaging on strategic policy initiatives to promote school delivery through the planning system.

Mike sits on the cross-government property profession board and is supporting DfE construction management colleagues onto pathways to professional accreditation, through a training partnership with the CIOB.