By Lucy Caulkett-
Kay Taylor CBENCA Director of Legal Services Kay is being recognised for being “an exceptional leader who enables and inspires officers to protect the public”(pictured)Kay’s tenacity and expertise have helped investigators secure the conviction of countless serious and organised criminals.
Among the high-profile investigations she has supported are Operation Venetic – the UK response to the international take down of EncroChat, an encrypted platform used by thousands of offenders to commit and plan some of the most serious types of crime, from drug and firearms supply to murder.
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Kay also supported Operation Stovewood – the NCA’s extensive, long-running investigation into non-familial child sexual abuse in Rotherham, which has to date secured the conviction of 49 offenders.Kay’s honour also recognises her work championing women and improving their representation within the NCA through a range of initiatives, including a female-focused mentoring scheme.
In 2026, Kay Taylor (also referred to in official contexts as Margaret Kay Taylor) is a highly distinguished legal professional whose career spans over three decades of senior leadership across the banking and government sectors.
Taylor leads the legal function for the NCA, managing the agency’s response to serious and organized crime. Her role involves overseeing complex litigation, advising on national security threats, and navigating the legal frameworks governing international law enforcement cooperation.
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Prior to her NCA appointment, Taylor served as the Deputy Legal Director at the FCDO, where she provided high-level legal counsel on international diplomatic and development matters.
Her career in the UK civil service includes multiple senior legal roles within the Ministry of Defence, where she handled sensitive defense-related legal policy and operational issues.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), General Manager, Group Governance:
In the Australian corporate sector, Taylor spent over a decade with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. She held the position of General Manager, Group Governance and served as a solicitor in the CBA Legal Department from 1994 to 2005.
She has held several significant board positions, including serving as a Director of Preferred Capital Limited (the issuer of PERLS III) until 2014. In 2017, she was appointed as an independent member of the Parole Board.
Taylor’s credentials are rooted in a strong foundation of legal and corporate governance training:
She holds a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree and is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and holds a Graduate Diploma in Company Secretary Practice from the Governance Institute of Australia.
Her 2026 New Year Honour as a recipient of the CB (Companion of the Order of the Bath) or similar high-level recognition underscores her status as one of the UK’s leading government lawyers.
Kay Taylor is recognized for her “intellectual challenge” and “collaborative culture” in legal leadership. Her expertise includes Regulatory & Criminal Law: Leading investigations and legal responses to organized crime and fraud.
Driving Improvements
Also honoured is the former team manager, National Economic Crime Centre Fiona Nicolson MBEFiona is honoured for being “a trailblazer in driving improvements across law enforcement” which have increased seizures of criminal assets and ensured the swift return of money to victims of fraud.
While working for the NCA, Fiona developed a new triage process for suspicious activity reporting – the mechanism through which the private sector alerts law enforcement to suspected money laundering. Her process focused efforts on denying the highest-harm criminals access to their assets and subsequently helped law enforcement seize assets worth hundreds of millions.
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Fiona Nicolson MBE is also a distinguished law enforcement professional and a former team manager at the National Economic Crime Centre (NECC), part of the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA). At 61 years old, she was recognized in the 2026 New Year Honours list for her transformative work in tackling financial crime and supporting victims of fraud.
Nicolson is credited with developing a groundbreaking triage process for Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs). This system allowed law enforcement to prioritize reports that targeted the highest-harm criminals, significantly improving the efficiency of money laundering investigations.
Fiona Nicolson is honoured for being a trailblazer in driving enforcements
Fiona also created a streamlined method and new national guidance for returning defrauded money to vulnerable victims, which directly resulted in around £7m being returned to 40,000 victims of fraud between 2021 and 2024.
Five more serving and former NCA officers, who are not being identified due to the nature of their work, also received MBEs for their services to law enforcement.
Tenacity and Leadership
Also honoured was Gavin Webb OBEGavin for his “tenacity and leadership” as the senior investigating officer of a ground-breaking operation to dismantle the largest ransomware group in the world. LockBit was responsible for a quarter of all global ransomware attacks between 2023 and 2024.
The group helped other criminals target innocent people, companies and public bodies by infecting their computer systems and stealing sensitive data. Victims lost billions of pounds paying ransoms and recovering their systems after attacks.
Gavin was the UK lead for Operation Cronos – an international operation in which specialist NCA officers infiltrated and seized control of LockBit’s own systems in 2024, stopping the group from carrying out further attacks and subsequently ruining their reputation in the criminal underworld. In a well-publicised and innovative move, the NCA used LockBit’s own dark web site to notify users that it had been taken over by law enforcement and to publicly name LockBit’s leader.
NCA Director General Graeme Biggar said: “These honours are well deserved by the officers, who have truly gone above and beyond to support victims and protect the public from the most serious and harmful crime.
“These officers represent the very best qualities of all officers working so hard across the National Crime Agency, and I am immensely proud of all that they have achieved.”
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