Board of Directors

The Board is responsible for the effective running of the Trust in line with established NHS objectives and priorities and in accordance with the highest standards of corporate governance.

It is also responsible for shaping the Trust's future and has a duty to consult and involve the Governors in the strategic planning of the organisation. The Chairman and non-executive directors are held to account by the Council of Governors of the Trust

If you have any queries regarding the Board of Directors, please email the Trust Company Secretary: huh-tr.enquiries@nhs.net

Sir John Gieve - Chairman

Headshot of Sir John GieveSir John joined the Trust in 2011 as a non-executive director and was appointed chair from 1 April 2019. He was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England from 2006 to 2009 as the Bank changed its role and approach to tackle the international financial crisis.

A career civil servant, Sir John was the Managing Director of the Treasury for three years and Permanent Secretary to the Home Office between 2001 and 2005. He is currently Chair of Nesta , the innovation foundation, and a non-executive director of Vocalink which supplies the main UK interbank payment systems.

Louise Ashley - Chief Executive of Homerton Healthcare and Place-based Leader of the City & Hackney Health and Care Partnership

Headshot photo of Louise AshleyLouise Ashley became Chief Executive of Homerton Healthcare and Place-based Leader of the City & Hackney Health and Care Partnership in October 2022, having, for the previous 4 years been CEO at Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust. Louise has excellent knowledge of the NHS and extensive experience working in healthcare at all levels and in all settings. A registered nurse and health visitor she is committed to ensuring the care delivered to patients, clients and communities is of the highest quality. She sees her role as ensuring staff have the support they need, to not only do their job, but to enjoy their work lives too! 
Louise has, throughout her career, worked with communities to promote equity and respect and to design and deliver the best possible health and care services for the populations she has served.

Louise is no stranger to the Trust, having been the Senior Nurse for Children’s Services back in the 1990s, leading the development of Starlight Children’s Unit and then later in 2012 returning as Director of Organisational Development  to support patient and public involvement. Louise has an in depth knowledge and love of North East London, having worked in just about every acute and community provider across the patch!

Bas Sadiq - Deputy Chief Executive Officer

Headshot of Bas SadiqBas’s career in healthcare spans over 19 years; her first NHS role being outpatient receptionist before moving into operational management and senior leadership roles. She joins us from Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust where she was the Chief Improvement and Strategy Officer responsible for setting up the Trust's Improvement and Innovation Academy. 

Passionate about building trusting partnerships and collaborating across organisations Bas is committed to making a meaningful difference to the health and wellbeing of residents, particularly many of whom may not have had equal access to health and social care or whose health suffers because of deprivation. People and communities are at the heart of her approach to leadership championing and empowering front-line staff and patient partners to drive innovation and sustainable change.

Emma Rowland - Chief Operating Officer

Headshot of Emma RowlandDr Emma Rowland became Chief Operating Officer in May 2023 having been a Consultant in Emergency Medicine at Homerton Healthcare since 2012, and the Associate Medical Director for the Emergency, Medical and Rehabilitation Services (EMRS) division at Homerton Healthcare from 2019 to 2022.  

Emma trained in several London hospitals including Homerton University Hospital, the Royal London, the Whittington, and Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.  Emma has extensive experience of leading improvement in the urgent emergency care pathway in provider organisations and across systems for the benefit of patients and staff. She is committed to ensuring equity of health and care for all. 

Emma led the Emergency Medicine team at Homerton Healthcare to achieve two outstanding ratings from the CQC.  She has held of number of north east London wide roles developing and delivering innovative work streams ambulance including on ambulance handover, front door flow, and Urgent Treatment Centres (UTC), to improve the Urgent Emergency Care pathway.  Emma has worked with the NHS England Urgent Emergency Care team on strategies to improve ambulance handover processes which has featured in the national UEC recovery plan.

Dr Deblina Dasgupta - Chief Medical Officer

Headshot of Dr. Deblina DasguptaDr Deblina Dasgupta has worked at Homerton for the past 13 years as a Consultant Physician in Geriatric and General Medicine. She has been Associate Medical Director since 2016 and Clinical Lead for Elderly Care, Stroke and Intermediate Care since 2012.

Deblina trained in a number of London hospitals including The Whittington, University College London and Newham before joining Homerton. She has been a leader in developing simulation training in geriatric and general internal medicine in London and an innovator in establishing the pioneering Integrated Independence Team for City and Hackney.

Deblina has led the successful medical productivity programme to improve patient journeys across the hospital and the community. She was Regional Chair of the British Geriatric Society (BGS) between 2009 and 2012 and England Council Member of the BGS during the same period.

Breeda McManus - Chief Nurse and Director of Clinical Governance

Headshot of Breeda McManusBreeda joined the Trust in December 2021 from Whittington Health where she was Deputy Chief Nurse, and has worked in the NHS in a variety of clinical and managerial roles.

Breeda is an experienced renal nurse passionate about ensuring the delivery of high quality care to all service users, ensuring patient safety and engagement, and involvement of patients in all aspects in the delivery of their care. Breeda believes in engaging and supporting staff to develop as the key to achieving the delivery of safe effective care. She aspires to support and empower front line clinicians to continue to improve quality, safety, efficiencies and constantly strive to deliver patient centred services.

Breeda has led nurse education and research in her various roles including as Honorary Senior Lecturer at London South Bank University. She is currently undertaking the Florence Nightingale Senior Scholar programme.

Rob Clarke - Chief Finance Officer

Headshot of Rob ClarkeRob joined the Trust in September 2022 from Barts Health NHS Trust where he was Deputy Chief Finance Officer (Strategic Planning). Prior to that Rob worked as an Improvement Director for NHSE/I supporting Trusts to exit special measures, and during the covid pandemic he took on the role of Director of Finance at the NHS Nightingale Hospital London.  

Before joining the NHS, he spent over 15 years working in various healthcare consultancy roles, latterly as Partner in a firm specialising in clinical productivity and efficiency. He is a Chartered Accountant with a ‘big four’ healthcare advisory background with experience ranging from audit, strategy development, operational restructuring, clinical transformation, cost reduction, and stakeholder engagement. 

Tom Nettel - Chief People Officer

Headshot of Tom NettelTom joined the Trust in November 2019. He was previously the Director of Workforce, Improvement and Strategy at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore. Tom began his NHS career in 2006 in East Kent as a national graduate scheme trainee in human resources. He worked for four years in HR at what is now called London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust based at both Ealing and Northwick Park hospitals. Tom rates one of his achievements to be helping transform staff experience at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital; this resulted in the Trust becoming a leading organisation nationally for positive staff experience in the NHS.

Dr Mike Gill – Non-Executive Director

Headshot of Dr. Mike GillDr Mike Gill is an experienced senior medical leader.

From 2014-2018 he was Medical Director at Health 1000: The Wellness Practice, a new type of GP surgery which looked after patients with multiple medical conditions in their own homes. The Practice also supported the care of patients in Nursing Homes.

Prior to this he had been a Medical Director for over 12 years at Newham University Hospital NHS Trust, a similar role at Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust and Associate Medical Director at Barts Health NHS Trust. He is Chair of Council of the London Clinical Senate and Chair of Kent and Medway Acute Stroke Services Joint Committee.

Mike was Joint Clinical Director for the Health for North East London programme nine years ago which looked at the configuration of provider services in east London.

Mike was Interim Medical Director at Homerton two years ago and his links to the hospital go back further as he was a Medical Registrar and later Senior Registrar at the hospital and on the commissioning team for the hospital in 1985-6 and remembers moving the first patient into the then new hospital building when it opened.

Dr Mark Rickets – Non-Executive Director

Headshot of Dr. Mark RicketsDr Mark Rickets qualified over 30 years ago and has spent most of his medical career working as a GP in the London Borough of Hackney.

Following time spent working in under-graduate then post-graduate medical education he has undertaken a number of NHS management roles, notably: 2012 - 2021 as clinical lead for Primary Care across City and Hackney; 2018 - 2022 as Chair of City and Hackney Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and 2019 - 2022 as Clinical Responsible Officer for General Practice for the North East London Health and Care Partnership.

In 2022 he became one of the 2 Primary Care Partner Members on the newly formed Integrated Care Board for North East London’s Integrated Care System.

Prior to becoming a Non-executive Director at Homerton Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust in 2020, he was, for a number of years, the City and Hackney CCG representative on the Trust’s Council of Governors.

Cherron Inko-Tariah MBE - Non-Executive Director

Headshot of Cherron Ink-TariahCherron Inko-Tariah MBE is an author, consultant, facilitator and coach. Cherron is a former civil servant and has undertaken leadership roles in various policy and strategic positions across Whitehall, including working with Ministers and Permanent Secretaries.

In 2011, Cherron received an MBE for her services to Government and for her work in the faith community with young people.

In 2012, Cherron left the Civil Service to follow her passion; staff networks and the positive impact they can have on the individual and organisation. Cherron has since founded The Power of Staff Networks consultancy where she provides a wide range of services.

During her career, she has achieved a Post Graduate Diploma in Human Resource Management, and a Masters Degree in Employment Studies and Human Resource Management. Cherron is also a qualified career coach with the Institute of Leadership and Management. 

Rommel Pereira - Non-Executive Director

Headshot of Rommel PereiraRommel has a track record in finance, business transformation, technology, customer service, procurement and business development.

Until recently, he was an Executive Director at the Bank of England attending the various committees of the Bank. Prior to this he was an Executive Director of the Financial Services Compensation Scheme after spending five years as Group Chief Operating Officer for the Metropolitan Housing Partnership.  His earlier career included senior management roles at JP Morgan Chase.

His recent non-executive roles include the One Housing Group and Shepherds Bush Housing Group.

Andrew Hudson - Non-Executive Director

Headshot of Andrew HudsonAndrew has extensive experience spanning strategy and operations in central and local government and the voluntary sector.

Andrew worked for the Treasury during the 1990s becoming head of the health team during the first comprehensive spending review.

He worked for Essex County Council, becoming Deputy Chief Executive (Finance and Performance) between 2002 and 2004. He re-joined central government as CEO of the Valuation Office Agency, and then rose to be Director General, Public Services at the Treasury for three years.

His current roles include being Chair of the Centre for Homelessness Impact, Vice Chair of Volunteering Matters and a non-executive director at the Clarion Housing Group.

Abi Olapade - Non-Executive Director

Photo of Abi OlapadeAbi initially joined the Trust in December 2021 through the NHS England and NHS Improvement  NExT Director scheme which aims to provide experience of Board level roles within NHS Trusts.  Following this, Abi was appointed to the Board in July 2022 following an open competition.

She is the Founder and CEO of AG-iATM Consulting Services, which provides consulting and delivery of strategic Digital Transformation initiatives in the Capital Markets sector where she has over 25 years’ experience.

Abi has Trustee roles with Citizens Advice Redbridge and Aldridge Education Multi Academy Trust; is a Governor of Davenant Foundation School; as well as an Independent Panel Member (IPM) for Public Appointments to several government departments and Board Advisor to several London based youth development charities.

Abi is passionate about the adoption of innovative technology solutions that improve healthcare outcomes and patient experiences, while also enabling cost and carbon emission reductions.