Julie Godley is succeeding Craig Brown as director of intermediary at Legal & General Insurance, leading the insurer’s distribution of protection products through advisers.
Godley is taking the role on an interim basis from the end of February to replace Brown who is moving to chief executive of L&G’s home finance division.
Brown is replacing Claire Singleton who is returning to a group general counsel position having taken on the Home Finance role in 2019. She will also step down from the board of the Equity Release Council.
Brown (pictured) has been director of intermediary for Legal & General Insurance since June 2017 and will take over from Singleton on 28 February.
Brown joined Legal & General in 2012 and has held several senior commercial and operational roles during that time, most recently leading the distribution of protection products via intermediaries and has previously held roles at Aviva and Lloyds Banking Group.
L&G restructuring
In October Health & Protection exclusively revealed that L&G was overhauling its operations and merging its insurance and retail retirement divisions into a retail division to be led by CEO, Bernie Hickman.
L&G described Brown as “exceptionally well placed” to lead the home finance division in its mission to transition later life mortgages into mainstream retirement planning – which it said was a key ambition of the newly formed retail division.
Commenting on Brown’s appointment, Hickman said: “Having co-founded Legal & General Home Finance in 2015, I remain passionate about the potential value of property to achieving better retirement outcomes for people in later life.
“Lifetime and retirement interest-only (RIO) mortgages can help meet a diverse range of challenges across customer demographics, from interest-only mortgage capital repayments to wealth planning.
“Craig brings both an essential understanding of the intermediary landscape and broad commercial experience, making him ideally placed to grow our market share.”
Brown added: “I’m absolutely delighted to be continuing my career at Legal & General with this new position, and I’m looking forward to working with a talented team of individuals to develop and grow what is already an excellent business.
“I think there is a huge opportunity with the growing relevance of property to people’s long-term planning, to move later life lending into the mainstream – and I believe Legal & General can play a key role in leading this transition.”
