Meet our Trustees

I have been a Trustee at Choice Support for just over seven years. I want to help Choice Support to fulfil their values and support people to lead the lives that they want and are entitled to. I believe that our innovation and commitment to provide personalised support is fundamental to this.

I’m retired but worked in adult social care for most of my working life in operational, managerial, and commissioning roles, mainly with people with learning disabilities. In that time, I came to realise that professionals in statutory services didn’t really know what the people they supported wanted. People were often placed in inappropriate provision with inadequate support causing harm to people and their families. Discriminatory failings in healthcare of people with learning disabilities are now well documented.

While there has been progress and improvement in the way people are supported and cared for, there is still much room for improvement. Particularly in healthcare, housing, employment, personalised support, personal relationships and improving the pay and conditions of a still largely unrecognised and undervalued workforce.

When not reading papers from Choice Support I enjoy travel, gardening and spending time with my family.

I am delighted to be on the Board of Trustees at Choice Support. I am an engineer by profession and began my career in property development consultancy.

In 2009 I established my own domiciliary care business in South Manchester providing care and support to adults and children. I worked diligently to establish an award-winning service and became a leading care provider in the area. My focus was enabling the people we support to remain independent in their own homes, and I worked to develop innovative solutions to achieve this.

I have three children and in my spare time work with several charities. My proudest accomplishment is travelling to the Syrian refugee camps to raise funds and support displaced families. I also sit as a Magistrate in court and am a member of the BAME group in the Magistrates Association where I will continue to champion diversity, something I am passionate about.

I became a Trustee of Choice Support to give back to the community and use my skills to support and safeguard vulnerable people. I hope that I can add my value to the work they already do and collectively make a lasting difference to the people we support.

I have been the Chair of Trustees - of mcch initially and then of Choice Support following the merger in 2019.

I am a qualified social worker by background and was Director of Adult Social Services for Kent County Council before working on improvement in adult social care at the Local Government Association for six years, until 2017 when I retired.

I have always been interested in how to make sure that people with disabilities have choice and control in their lives, and so it has been a privilege to be involved with Choice Support which lives its values in practical ways, day by day.

With the pandemic and lacking a vision for adult social care set by government, I think the future lies with good not for profit organisations, and so I firmly believe that Choice Support can make an even bigger contribution to improving the lives of the people we support.

I have been a Trustee at Choice Support since 2016. My career has been in the NHS, where I trained as a mental health nurse. I was the Director of Nursing and Modernisation for the Kent and Medway NHS Trust. I also completed an MBA in strategic health service management, and trained in family therapy and coaching. Since my retirement in 2008, I continue to work within the NHS at a national level.

Being a Trustee for Choice Support has been a great pleasure as I believe it is an organisation with the right values, always putting the people we support at the forefront of all we do. The learning disability services provided by Choice Support are some of the best available in the country and I’m proud to be associated with them. Our smaller mental health services are growing fast and demonstrating that they are innovative and able to adapt to the needs of those we provide services for and for our commissioners.

In recent years I have been involved in working with other countries to support the development of high-quality mental health services. I have worked in Cairo in Egypt and Abu Dhabi and I am currently working in Ghana in West Africa. I very much enjoy using my training, experience, and expertise to help influence better mental health care for all.