Lewis, Simon
Senior Executive Lawyer
Simon is a skilled corporate and commercial lawyer with experience leading transactional and advisory engagements with a focus on the government, financial services and defence sectors.
He has significant expertise in the development and negotiation of corporate transactions, and project and procurement arrangements, having practised in leading private law firms in Australia and the UK. He also has advanced finance training.
Simon has experience advising Commonwealth agencies on governance and compliance matters in procurement and program contexts. He has been trusted to undertake independent reviews into organisational governance on several occasions, in some cases in highly sensitive areas.
Simon has held several management appointments at AGS. He presently leads our commercial team in Sydney and Brisbane, he is the Client Service Manager for the AGS Defence account and he served as an AGS nominee on the Executive Board of the Attorney-General’s Department throughout 2022.
Relevant experience
Examples of Simon’s relevant experience include:
Projects
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Climate risk management – advising the Treasury and the Australian Reinsurance Pool Corporation on the design and establishment of the $10 billion Cyclone Reinsurance Scheme to support affordability of insurance for residents of Northern Australia, including development of legislative amendments and market-facing agreements.
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Energy transition – advising the Department of Climate Change Energy the Environment and Water on a series of financial underwriting arrangements to accelerate the construction of electricity transmission and storage infrastructure to facilitate the transition of the grid to renewable energy sources as part of the Rewiring the Nation program.
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COVID Support – advising the Treasury on the development of the $10 billion SME business loan guarantee scheme and associated ‘Show Starter’ loan guarantee scheme, as part of the Commonwealth response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Western Sydney – advising the Department of Infrastructure on the administration of the $2bn Commonwealth subordinated loan in support of the Westconnex project.
Procurement
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Defence Procurement – advising Defence on legal, probity and process issues in various materiel and services procurements, requiring application of procurement policies and preparation of tender documents using both ASDEFCON template suite.
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ICT – advising Defence on acquiring software and services using DTA and other whole-of-Commonwealth panels, as well as directly negotiated arrangements.
Governance
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Board governance – advising various public and private sector boards on governance matters, including reporting, conflicts, indemnification and insurance issues.
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Capital management – advised the Department of Finance on the capital management of several Government Business Enterprises.
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CCE governance – advising several Corporate Commonwealth Entities on compliance with governance requirements of Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 (Cth) and various enabling legislation.
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Investigations – appointed by the Inspector General of the Australian Defence Force to advise on the conduct of several military justice inquiries.
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Organisational reviews – appointed to conduct independent reviews of internal legal teams of several Commonwealth agencies.
Qualifications
Masters of Laws, University of Sydney
Bachelor of Laws, University of New South Wales
Bachelor of Commerce, University of New South Wales
Graduate Diploma of Legal Practice, Griffith University
Completed levels I-III of the Charted Financial Analyst (CFA) Program