Trust Board profiles

Melloney Poole OBE, Chairman

Melloney joined IWT in October 2020. She is also chair at PHU which she joined in May 2017 and was appointed chair in November 2017.

Since 2015, she has been the head of the Armed Forces Covenant Fund and the other grant programmes funded by LIBOR (London Inter-bank Offered Rate) fines which directly supports the delivery of the Armed Forces Covenant across the UK.

Melloney is a corporate, charity, and administrative law solicitor with many years of private sector commercial and corporate experience and became the head of the legal department for the Big Lottery Fund in 2013. She developed the combined legal service department which now supports all the legal and governance matters for the Arts Council England, the Heritage Lottery Fund, and the Big Lottery Fund.

In addition, Melloney had had a parallel career as a non-executive director in the NHS, serving on the boards of 3 NHS trusts, and vice chair of the Health Foundation.

She has also been a volunteer and fundraiser for various charities and a magistrate on the Preston Bench. Melloney was awarded an OBE in the 2010 New Year Honours for legal and governance services.

Phil Berrington, Non-Executive Director

Phil joined the trust as an Associate Non-Executive Director in January 2019 and was made a Non-Executive Director in January 2022.

He is also an Executive Partner in IBM Consulting and leads accounts where clients are undergoing large and complex transformation journeys. In his consulting work Phil has experience of working in the public sector, notably with a large central government department helping them transform back-office functions and processes.

He currently leads IBM’s relationship with a quasi-public sector organisation. Phil is a Chartered Management Accountant (FCMA), a Chartered Management Consultant, and holds a post graduate diploma in Strategy & Innovation from Said Business School. He was appointed as a Non-Executive Director with PHU in February 2023.

Stephen Brooks, Non-Executive Director

Stephen joined the trust in January 2024 as a Non-Executive Director. In the first part of his career, he held senior HR roles in Bank of America, General Electric, Morgan Grenfell, and Deutsche Bank. He subsequently became a management consultant and partner at KPMG and PA Consulting. He led a wide range of business projects for public and private sector companies in the UK and abroad. His clients included Northern Rock, DWP, HM Treasury, NHS, BBC Worldwide, and Channel 4.

He is a Governor of Coventry University and chair of the commercial arm of the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, and the Royal Society for Arts, and an Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Medical Leadership & Management. Stephen lives in Cowes.

Dr Christopher Tibbs, Non-Executive Director

Christopher joined the trust as a Non-Executive Director in January 2022. He brings a long history of clinical practice and clinical leadership to the trust having previously been a Deputy Chief Executive and Medical Director. He also brings not only extensive clinical and managerial experience but also recent experience as a CQC inspection chair and he now works in the Regional and National Commissioning team and Regional Medical Directorate. Christopher also has long and strong links to the Island having had a home here for a number of years.

Dr Tim Peachey, Non-Executive Director

Tim joined the trust as a Non-Executive Director in April 2018. He qualified as a doctor in 1983 and worked as a consultant anaesthetist. Tim has held medical management roles at all levels in several acute hospitals including as the Medical Director of the Royal Free Hospital, and Chief Executive of Barnet and Chase Farm Hospitals. Tim has also worked as an Improvement director helping NHS trusts and as a Non-Executive Director of University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust.

Inga Kennedy CBE, Non-Executive Director

Inga joined the Trust in April 2022 as a Non-Executive Director. She has had a life-long career in healthcare, combining time in the NHS with service in the Royal Navy. Born in Aberdeen, she studied nursing at Queen Margaret College in Edinburgh followed by postgraduate studies in Edinburgh and London. A registered nurse, midwife, and lecturer, she worked in the NHS from 1980 to 1998.

Having joined the Royal Navy Reserve in 1987, she undertook full-time reserve service between 1998 and 2000 as a senior midwife in the Royal Naval Hospital Gibraltar. In 2000, she joined the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Naval Nursing Service (QARNNS). After being promoted to Commander in 2005, she served in Afghanistan in 2011 and was made Captain in November of that year. She was promoted to Commodore in 2015 and began serving as Inspector General of the Defence Medical Services the same year. In 2017, Commodore Kennedy was appointed Head of the Royal Navy Medical Service, a position she relinquished only recently.

Currently, Inga is still a registered and validated nurse and undertakes a portfolio of work focusing on healthcare. She is a Non-Executive Director with PHU, and is also a Trustee of an Independent Hospital in London, and Trustee of the White Ensign Association. 

Sara Weech, Non-Executive Director

Sara joined the trust as an Associate Non-Executive Director in January 2018 and was made a Non-Executive Director in January 2023. She is an experienced public sector executive director having spent many years working in complex health and social care systems including East and West Sussex, Hampshire, and the Isle of Wight. Sara has worked for both local authority and NHS organisations, and since 2013 has been Trustee and Chair of Mountbatten hospice.

Christine Slaymaker CBE, Non Executive Director

Christine has been Non Executive Director at PHU since 2017. Prior to this she was Chief Executive of Farnborough College of Technology, rated “Outstanding” for Quality and Financial Health. She is a business graduate and has held non-executive positions for a number of organisations including Farnborough Aerospace Consortium, Treloar School and College, a Royal Engineers charity, and the Enterprise M3 Local Enterprise Partnership. Christine was awarded a CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in June 2014. She is from the Portsmouth area and still lives locally.

Penny Emerit, Chief Executive

Penny joined our trust as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) in June 2023. Penny is an experienced and highly capable NHS leader and is also the CEO at PHU, a role which she has held since March 2021. Penny joined PHU in January 2018 as Director of Strategy and Performance and later added the Deputy Chief Executive portfolio to her responsibilities prior to taking on the CEO role. As CEO, Penny led PHU to a second CQC Good rating in July 2022 following a well-led inspection and core service inspection of medicine and urgent care services. She also led the development of the Trust’s ‘Working Together’ strategy. 

Penny has many years of experience in healthcare at national, regional, and local levels, covering policy, regulation, and service delivery, with a credible track record of delivery across the NHS in London and the South. Her expertise in strategy development and implementation alongside regulation and performance improvement drives her passion and commitment to delivering sustainable improvement for the benefit of patients, communities, and staff.

Joe Smyth, IWT Chief Officer

Joe joined our trust in October 2019. In his previous role he worked with 8 CCGs and 4 acute trusts to develop an acute clinical site strategy for North West London. Prior to that, Joe was the Chief Operating Officer (COO) at Hillingdon Hospitals for seven years and led on the creation of their Integrated Care Partnership. He was also the Director of Service Improvement at Epsom and St Helier in South London and spent 3 years at the Royal Bournemouth NHS Trust as their Deputy COO where he led the reconfiguration of their hospital sites.

Mark Orchard, Chief Financial Officer, Deputy Chief Executive 

Mark joined PHU in October 2019 as Chief Financial Officer before taking up the joint role with IWT in September 2023. Previously Mark was Executive Director of Finance at Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, one of four NHS providers working together with the Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group, as a wave one integrated care system. Mark is currently national chair of the NHS Providers Finance and Commercial Directors Network. Mark has also held the Wessex system Finance Director post at NHS England, the Commissioning Finance Director role at Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire, and more latterly, at NHS Bournemouth and Poole. Mark was national president of the Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) during 2016/17 and served a full 10 years as Trustee on their national Board between 2009 to 2019.

Prof Liz Rix, MBE, Chief Nurse

Liz has previously held a number of director-level nursing positions in large, integrated trusts, and most recently at University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust, where she was Chief Nurse. Liz is passionate about delivering quality care for patients through clinical leadership at all levels. She has the experience needed to develop strong nursing teams who manage workforce, patient experience, and environment, while also living the trust values: working together for patients, with compassion, as one team, and always improving. Liz is one of the few nurses to graduate from the NHS Management Training Scheme after working in the health service for a number of years.

Dr John Knighton, Chief Medical Officer

John spent 3 years gaining general medicine experience before training in intensive care medicine and anaesthesia in the South West and Wessex. He spent a year as a visiting instructor at the University of Michigan Hospital before taking a post in intensive care medicine and anaesthesia at PHU at the start of 2000. He led the design of the state-of-the-art critical care facilities, and was one of the clinical team leading on design for the whole hospital. He was Clinical Director for the Department of Critical Care from 2010 to 2016, during which it was rated as 'Outstanding' by the CQC. He has been a CQC specialist advisor for acute hospital inspections, and has a long-held passion for improving patient safety, and quality of services, championing an open and learning culture based on strong multi-disciplinary team working.

Nicole Cornelius, Chief People Officer

Nicole was appointed as Director of Workforce and Organisational Development for PHU in October 2018, before taking the joint role across both PHU and IWT Boards. She has many years experience working in the public sector, including the role of Director of HR and Corporate Services for Hampshire Constabulary, and senior roles within the probation service and local government. Nicole is passionate about creating an environment of support and wellbeing for staff, particularly in relation to keeping staff safe at work and addressing the issue of violence against staff. Nicole is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, and has a master’s degree from Cambridge University. She is also a member of the Independent Advisory Panel to the military.

Nikki Turner, Chief Transformation Officer

Nikki started her NHS career in 1998 on the Isle of Wight as a Project Manager. Since then she has held a variety of roles, leading operational areas across acute, community services, mental health and ambulance services as well as leading in service and system transformation. During her time working within the public services, she has also worked for Portsmouth & SE Hampshire Health Authority, Isle of Wight Council, and the former Isle of Wight Primary Care Trust. Nikki was the Deputy Chief Operating Officer before being appointed Director of Acute and latterly for Ambulance Services in 2018. In October 2019 Nikki took up the role of Director of Transformation, later becoming Director of Strategy, Partnerships and Digital. Nikki undertook the role of Acting CEO for IWT for a period of 6 months in 2022. In September 2023, Nikki was appointed as Chief Transformation Officer for IWT and PHU. Nikki holds a doctorate and is a Prince 2 Practitioner in Programme Management. She lives on the Isle of Wight and is passionate about the care we deliver to patients across Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight.

Peter Ridley, Chief Officer, PHU

Peter brings with him a wealth of NHS experience in senior roles. He has a strong track record in NHS finances as he joins us from NHS England where he held the role as Deputy Chief Finance Officer. He has also held roles leading strategy and performance at the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust.

Professor Anoop J Chauhan,MBE, Chief Research Officer  

Anoop has been the Director of Research at PHU since 2009 and is also a practising physician in respiratory and general medicine. Anoop has developed opportunities for patients throughout the region to participate in high quality research trials, introduced innovations in clinical pathways, developed new models of care, and helped set up a nationally recognised severe asthma centre in Portsmouth. His research has resulted in a positive impact on disease control, quality of life, healthcare usage and health economic benefits in patients with respiratory conditions. Anoop has helped multiple small and medium-sized businesses to secure funding, develop high-quality research studies and technology trials in support of the NHS. He has also set up the Portsmouth Technology Trials Unit to allow more health technology companies to work with patients and the NHS.