Who is our board

Elaine, who lives locally with her family in Craven, brings with her a passion, knowledge and experience of working with communities across our place. She has a wealth of extensive experience in public and social enterprise organisations with her work informing policy and practice nationally as well as locally. With a passion for communities and a focus on inequalities, Elaine is focused on making a sustainable impact for people living, working and visiting Bradford District and Craven as well as working with wider partners across the West Yorkshire integrated care system to make a difference to people’s lives across our region. This includes ensuring we attract, retain and develop a diverse workforce across health and care.

Away from work Elaine enjoys walking in the Dales, attending and volunteering at her local church, St Thomas’ in Sutton-in-Craven, and spending time with her family in Haworth and California.

Starting her career in social care before moving into community work, Elaine has built up a considerable track record of delivering widely recognised community-focused projects resulting in her being awarded an MBE for her work to design and deliver the Millennium Awards Grant Scheme for Bradford.

She has held senior leadership positions across Bradford District and Craven including roles as Chief Executive for Bradford Vision and Health Action Zone Director for Bradford Health Authority. Her most recent experience has seen her provide consultancy support working across the country with local government, health, voluntary sector and local communities. This includes facilitating Community Partnerships with Bradford District GPs; working with the Government of Jersey and partners to re-design children’s mental health and wellbeing services for the island and facilitating the Bradford VCS Alliance’s work to respond to local health and care winter pressures.

As well as being Place Lead for Bradford District and Craven Health and Care Partnership, Mel is the Chief Executive of Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust a post she has held since 2019. She is also a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) member of the West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts.
As the Place Lead for the Bradford District and Craven Health and Care Partnership, Mel is looking to embed the Act as One ethos across our partnership. Act as One describes our approach for our health and care partnership bringing together organisations, our colleagues and our communities to achieve our ambition of people being ‘happy, healthy at home’.

Mel qualified as a Registered General Nurse in 1990 and has worked in a number of management and leadership roles across Yorkshire and the North West. Mel was Chief Executive of The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust from January 2007 (taking it through its Foundation Trust application to a successful conclusion) prior to her appointment with Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in 2011 In 2015 Mel was invited by Baroness Cumberledge to be the provider Chief Executive representative on The National Maternity Review and continues to work in support of the maternity transformation programme as a member of the stakeholder council.

As a member of the West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts, Mel leads on critical care and trauma, and is the lead CEO for the local maternity services network.

Foluke is the Chief Executive of Airedale NHS FT. Previously Director of Strategic Transformation in the Humber Coast & Vale Health and Care Partnership for NHS England and NHS Improvement.

Prior to this, she worked as Chief Operating Officer at University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS FT for five years.  Foluke’s early career was as a Clinical Scientist in Audiology specialising in paediatrics and cochlear implants, following which she held senior roles in the Department of Health and NHS Employers. She has also held senior operational management roles at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust initially as Directorate Manager, after which she led their Cancer Centre as General Manager.

During her career in the NHS, Foluke has worked for provider and commissioning organisations in local and regional roles, as well as for national agencies.  She brings a wealth of knowledge and understanding of the changing NHS landscape and its implications for health, care, VCSE sectors and beyond.

Foluke has a keen interest and experience in workforce and people development; in particular in leadership development for everyone.  She is a champion for diversity, inclusivity and personalisation, strongly believing that every individual in an organisation is vital, wherever they work, whatever they do; bringing a richness to services for communities we serve.

David is currently Medical Director at Airedale NHS Foundation Trust. He was previously Deputy Medical Director and Divisional Director for Surgery and Diagnostics at Airedale from February 2018. David trained as an ENT Surgeon in Glasgow, London and Christchurch, New Zealand. He was appointed as a Consultant Otolaryngologist in 2011, with a specialist interest in Rhinology and Vertigo. He was Lead Clinician for ENT within NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde from 2012 to 2017

David is actively involved in system leadership at Place, and across West Yorkshire, and has been Co-Chair of the Bradford District and Craven System Planned Care Oversight Board. He is currently Clinical Lead for Access to Healthcare in Bradford District and Craven, and Executive Lead for the Yorkshire Imaging Collaborative. David has had an interest in leadership and management for many years, and participated in Cohort 10 of the NHS Scotland Delivering the Future leadership development programme. He is a member of the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management, and a member of the BMA Medical Managers’ Committee.

She has held this role since 2015. Prior to that she was Chief Executive of the City of York Council for six years. Kersten is also: chair of the UK preventative research partnership funded ‘Act Early’ programme with Tower Hamlets, chair of the Young Foundation, chair of the Bradford and District Well-being Executive, a co chair of the WY local resilience forum and the lead CX for sport and culture for the mayoral combined authority. She is a lay Canon of Bradford Cathedral. Kersten’s career has included work in the voluntary sector, higher education and central government as well as 30 years in local government.

As a system leader Kersten is committed to work which puts individuals, families at communities at its heart in the creation of well-being, the primary purpose of public service. Working in and alongside communities and marshalling the assets and talents of all, from those communities, the VCSE, public and private sectors to deliver a better quality of life for all, is an organising principle for her work. And the further ‘up stream’ we can work to create well-being and prevent ill health the better.

Kersten draws on experience over her career in working in policy and strategy development, community development, social innovation, equality diversity and inclusion and organisation and employee development. Kersten has 3 children, two stepchildren, two grandchildren and has lived in the Bradford District for over thirty years.

Andrew is a qualified accountant and has a wide range of Board experience from a career in regulated financial services, mainly with member owned organisations. Until spring 2016, Andrew was the Group Director Risk, Audit and Compliance of a locally based regulated financial service group. Since May 2014 Andrew has been NED of the Ecology Building Society who are based in Silsden and are a mutual who demonstrate strong ethical values.

Andrew became a Non-Executive Director of Airedale NHS Foundation Trust on 1 June 2016 and was appointed Vice Chair from 1 July 2017. In January 2018 Andrew became the Trust’s Chair.

Living in Skipton, Andrew is also directly involved in a number of activities that support the Craven community.

Andrew will use all this knowledge and experience in striving for the best possible outcomes on population health for Bradford District & Craven with the resources available.

I qualified from Leeds in 2002 and joined the Bradford GP training scheme, working in Bradford ever since. I have been a GP trainer and have interests in MSK problems. I now split my week between core GP at the Saltaire & Windhill Medical Partnership and Chair of Bradford Care Alliance CIC (BCA)

Primarily, I am a jobbing GP who brings the experience of working with our people and in our system. In my leadership roles I have worked as a commissioner, initially strengthening patient voice and running the Clinical Forum before moving into “out of hospital” commissioning as a Clinical Board member. I then founded the Trust Primary Care federation (which continues to provide services for our patients) but recognised the need for a Community Interest Company supporting primary care infrastructure and delivering primary care services at scale. I am now the Chair of BCA who created the Clinical Advisory Board (12 Clinical Directors from BD&C) which I also have been elected to Chair.

As Deputy Chair of the Bradford and Airedale Branch of YORLMC, Dr Danielle Hann works with the Branch Chair to provide leadership of General Practitioners within the Bradford and Airedale area. She is involved in negotiation and liaison with stakeholders on behalf of the branch and is also a Director of the YORLMC Ltd Board. Danielle is also Medical Director of YORLMC.

Danielle has worked in Bradford since she was a GP trainee and was a partner and medical director of a large group of practices until February 2022.  Danielle was also a clinical director of her Primary Care Network (PCN) until February 2022. Danielle has recently taken up an associate wellbeing lead role with GPMplus and is focussing on the wellbeing of general practice teams. Danielle will continue to work clinically in BDC as a locum GP.

Melanie is currently an Independent Non-Executive Director

At Airedale NHS Foundation trust. Most recently Melanie was the Deputy Principal for Kirklees College and Dewsbury Centre Principal.   She has held numerous senior roles including Vice principal Corporate Services, Kirklees College, Director of Corporate Services, Kirklees College, Assistant Principal for Human Resources and Equality, Huddersfield Technical College and Director of Corporate Services and Clerk to the Corporation, The Community College Hackney.

Melanie has spent the majority of her career working within the Further Education sector mainly in a strategic role reporting into and regularly advising and supporting the Board and its associated committees. Melanie has over 20 years’ experience leading and managing the Human Resources and Organisational Development divisions, as well as having responsibility for the Estates and Capital Strategy, marketing and communications, ICT,  and Risk Management and Health and Safety.

Julie was born and educated in Bradford and lives in the city. Julie has a Masters degree in Finance and Accountancy and is a qualified accountant and became a Non-Executive Director for Bradford Teaching Hospitals Foundation Trust in September 2019. Julie was previously the Deputy Chief Officer and Chief Finance Officer for the three Bradford District and Craven Clinical Commissioning Groups and prior to that worked in the private finance sector for 11 years before joining the NHS in 1992. Julie is also a board member at Incommunities.

Julie brings a wealth of NHS experience, with a career that has spanned over 27 years working across a number of NHS organisations including both providers and commissioners and covering a variety of senior leadership roles.

Strategic Director of Health and Wellbeing, Bradford Council and Director of Integration for Bradford District NHS Foundation Care Trust

Iain has responsibility for adult social care for Bradford Council and is a system partner in Bradford.

Iain started work for the Benefits Agency. He worked for Social Services in his home town of Barnsley. After moving to Hertfordshire in 1999, he spent five years working for the Probation Service, returned to Social Services in Barnet and became Assistant Director of Adult Care Services for Hertfordshire in 2008. He became Director there in 2013.

Iain is a Trustee of the national Association of Directors of Adult Social Services as Treasurer and is Network Chair for Commissioning in the Yorkshire & Humber region.

Prior to joining Bradford Council, Iain spent 12 months acting into the Chief Executive role of the Sustainability and Transformation Partnership for Hertfordshire and West Essex. The STP was identified as an accelerator site by NHS England and Iain led partners to become an Integrated Care System by April 2020, completing their NHS Long Term Plan submission.

Iain is passionate about the integration of adult social care and associated health services, particularly as the client group ages with more complex needs. He was recently also appointed as Director of Integration for Bradford District NHS Care Trust with an honorary contract to seek our impactful integration opportunities in our local system out-of-hospital.

I have been in Bradford since 2016 and Director of Public Health since 2017. I have 2 teenage boys, Jake and Daniel and a miniature labradoodle called Charlie. I have lived in Holmfirth since 2007 where I moved after being in the Scottish Borders.

I have worked in the NHS since 1992 first as a nurse specialising in acute medicine and then oncology and later as a Health Visitor. My first Public Health Specialist role was in Scotland applying public health expertise to primary care and community services and moving on to Kirklees where I lead on health and care public health in a PCT and later in Clinical Commissioning Groups. For the past 8 years I have worked in Local Authorities. I have plaid an active role in the development of the ICS and am the Deputy Chair of the Y&H DPH network.

I bring this experience, strategic leadership and a strong local knowledge

Carole has worked in the NHS for 42 years in a variety of roles beginning her career as a nurse, midwife and district nurse, progressing to Senior management roles in Community health and Acute services followed by 12 years in Director of Nursing and Director of Operations roles working in South Yorkshire and the North East, this included two years as Director of Nursing and Quality for NHS England’s Lancashire Area team.

Carole has also worked as a specialist advisor to the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the independent regulator of health and care services, and currently works as a Fitness to Practice Chair of Investigating committees for the Nursing and Midwifery Council.

Carole moved to BD&C in the 1980s to become a Midwife then a District Nurse, caring for families living in the rural areas of Craven. She has also managed Community services across the wider Aire and Wharfe valley localities as well as spending part of her career in Acute Operational management with AHNST. This has given her a deep understanding of the complex, differing needs of communities particularly the health inequalities which exist in both rural and urban areas. She understands that the Partnership needs to be focussed on strategies which listen to the voice of the people we serve and make sure the services provided are of high quality and sufficiently flexible to meet the needs of those communities.

Therese is currently the Chief Executive of Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust

She joined from Southport and Ormskirk Hospital NHS Trust, where she was Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Strategy. Therese joined Southport and Ormskirk from Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation

Trust in 2016, and previously worked at 5 Boroughs Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and Liverpool Community Health.

She also spent a short period working in the private sector with GP provider companies.

Before joining the NHS in 1999, Therese spent nine years working in health development in Zimbabwe, Somaliland and Pakistan.

In July 21 Therese was pleased to be elected to sit as a Trustee on the Board of NHS Providers where she represents the interests of mental health Trusts. Therese has extensive NHS Board level experience, working across community, mental health, acute and specialist healthcare in the NHS.

Therese has extensive NHS Board level experience, working across community, mental health, acute and specialist healthcare in the NHS.

I am a family man, with 3 fabulous children and soon to become a grandad for the third time. Sport has always been a passion of mine, playing cricket, football and even rugby union in my youth. Sadly, now limited to just watching the professionals and the local cricket club. I still like to keep fit and do a spot of running and lots of walking my daughters dog!

I was born in a council house in Ashton – u -Lyne and my father was a huge influence on me, his proudest moment when his four children obtained their degrees. He passed on the ethics of hard work and education, which all our families have followed.

I have been a Chief Executive in local government since July 2000 and sat on health partnerships for most of that time. My background is Environmental Health and Housing, very much linked to prevention and addressing inequalities in urban and rural settings, the problems may appear the same, the solutions are often very different. Great believer in a partnership approach, no organisation has all the answers and the Nolan principles of good governance.

I have chaired boards at a regional and national level and always try to make a difference to the public that we all serve in the public sector.