Category Archives: Board of Trustees

Derian House Children’s Hospice has appointed a new Chair of the Board of Trustees.

Paul Morton has taken on the top job and plans to ensure the charity continues to become the gold standard for children’s hospice care, setting the benchmark for others across the UK.

Derian’s previous Chair of trustees Karen Swindley retired from her position earlier this week, after nine years’ service.

Under her watchful eye, Derian House earned a rating of Outstanding from the Care Quality Commission (CQC), had a £1.7m refurbishment, and introduced free holidays for families.

Paul said he will build on the great work already done and looks forward to leading the Board of Trustees on the charity’s next exciting chapter.

Paul joins Derian following a career as a global healthcare leader spanning four decades.

He has worked at the highest level at some of the biggest private healthcare and medical technology companies across the world.

In his free time, the dad of three grown up children, who lives with his wife Nicky in Euxton, Chorley, also fosters Guide dogs, is a member of Euxton Parish Council, and serves as a Magistrate at Cumbria and Lancashire Family Court.

He has a raft of experience on charity boards, with a focus on building communities and helping people to create opportunities, enabling them to thrive whatever their circumstances.

He said: “I’ve had a base in Euxton for many years and Derian House has always been there. For as long as I can remember I’ve wanted get involved, but had never had the time before now having been so busy in my careers.

“The amazing and important work Derian does with families fits in with my thinking and my beliefs. I have always strived to ensure that children have the best opportunities, whatever they are going through, and whatever that may look like to them.

“I’m absolutely honoured to have been given the chance to be involved in influencing the future of this incredible charity and I am looking forward to utilising all of my experience and knowledge to help Derian House thrive and innovate.”

Karen Edwards, Chief Executive of Derian House Children’s Hospice, said: “We are thrilled to welcome Paul to the Derian family. He brings with him not only a wealth of professional experience but a deep-rooted passion for helping children and families live their best lives.

“We’re excited for the future and look forward to working with Paul to continue delivering the very best care and support to families who need us.”

Karen Swindley, former Chair of the Board of Trustees at Derian House Children’s Hospice, said: “I wish Paul every success in taking over the reins and leading the board of Derian House forward from the amazing place we have taken it to.”

Dear Team Derian,

As promised, I am writing to update you on discussions at our Trustee board meeting last week.

It was really pleasing that we had the opportunity to discuss a number of areas where we are performing exceptionally well.  We were delighted to note the financial position at the year end.  We are in a strong position and, for this year, and despite some challenges we are hopeful that we will retain a good level of statutory funding.  We were also pleased to note that we have seen significant improvements in our retail offer and performance.  Thanks to the efforts of the team we now feel in a position where we can start to further develop and build our retail offer. This is a significant shift from where we were twelve months ago.

We were also delighted to hear of the progress that is being made in strengthening our governance arrangements. This work will continue over the year and will be a continued focus for the board.

Our performance in marketing, retail and income generation remains strong and today I have been delighted to see our Derian advert on television for the first time.

One of the key decisions that the board took at its meeting this month was to approve the annual pay award of 3% which will be applied with immediate effect. We will of course keep our eye on the pay award given to the NHS and may decide to review our position in light of that announcement later in the year.

We were delighted to read a number of impact stories that were presented to us.  It is really important that we continue to understand the significant difference that the smallest thing can make to our children, young people and their families. The impact stories are a really good way of reminding us what we are here for and the board takes great pleasure in recognising the achievements of our teams.

So whilst there was lots for us to celebrate, we were also extremely concerned to hear of a number of incidents which may impact the safety of those in our care. We expect that our services are of the highest standard not only from a safety perspective but from an experience perspective. Our families deserve no less than the absolute best. They deserve safe, compassionate  care and in every contact should expect to experience our teams professional and ‘over and above’ response. Catherine shared with us the care improvement plan, which we were pleased to see but we need to see urgent progress made in this area. Care is our core business and we have to see urgent and significant improvement in this area. If we fail in providing outstanding care, all our other achievements are meaningless. It is for this reason that following the board meeting and a further issue on Sunday, I took the decision with the Karen our Chief Executive to suspend our in house overnight care services for a period in order that we can undertake a ‘reset’. I ask that all those in the care team, look to themselves and take personal responsibility for supporting us to be the best we can be for those we serve.  I will be in regular contact the team to ensure that we are seeing the required change brought about.

In the meantime, thank you for all you continue to do to support our children, young people and their families.

Hello Team Derian,

The first thing I need to say is a massive apology to you all for I realise that my note to you all following our trustee meetings has been missing for some time now and for that I am sorry.

So this the start of my recompense and I promise to write to you all following every trustee meeting going forward to ensure you are kept up to date with our discussions.

Firstly I think it is really important that I acknowledge that the last year has been a time of considerable change for all. Change is never easy, but we all have our parts to play in ensuring that Derian House is the best place for our children, young people and their families to receive care, and is the best place to work. We can expect that change will cause uncertainty and not everyone will like the changes that we must make to ensure the future sustainability of Derian House.  The recent staff feedback from the We are Derian forum certainly tells us that we have much left to do to achieve our aims but the board of trustees are committed to ensuring that we move forward on our journey to be the best we can be. The trustees are grateful that the senior leadership team openly shared the feedback that you gave and we have seen the response from the senior leadership team and agree with the actions that they have committed to put in place to enable us to continue on our journey of cultural improvement. We noted comments about the visibility of and access to trustees. It is important to remember that trustees are not officers of the charity but are volunteers, many of whom have full time roles in other organisations.  Clearly, if there are serious or legitimate concerns from staff, the trustees are committed to understanding that and supporting resolution and so I welcome the implementation of formal speak up arrangements and am delighted to report that Helen Curtis has agreed to take on the freedom to speak up trustee role that will give you the route through which you can raise concerns that are not or cannot be dealt with through your line management or internal escalation arrangements.

We have seen a number of staff leave the organisation over the last 12 months and I’m hoping that you will have seen the recruitment campaign that we have in place in order to improve our staffing levels so that we can open as many beds as possible to support our children families and young people. In the short-term, we know that vacancies will present us with a challenge and but we are hopeful that we will be able to recruit a number of excellent staff over the next few months which will see us move back to full capacity and make Derian house a thriving hub of activity.

Alongside the staff, the feedback and the recruitment challenges that we face, the board also discussed finances. Whilst we are fortunate as a charity to have reserves in place that will enable us to continue with the excellent work that you all do, it is important that we spend our money wisely. The future of the statutory funding that we receive is uncertain and that means it is even more important we are careful with the scarce and precious resource that our supporters provide us with. I would ask you all to support the notion of spending wisely and spending well.

One of the other areas of focus at our meeting was governance. We need to focus on improving our governance processes and ensuring that we are able to deliver care at the highest standard.  The senior leadership team will be asking for your support in ensuring that we raise standards, improve processes, improve culture and to that end, maintain our CQC outstanding rating.

Though change is hard and we know we have much to do, it is an exciting journey which we know can lead to more great things.

Thank you for all you continue to do.

Dear All,

I have just had the pleasure of meeting with our new Chief Executive, Karen, as part of her induction.  I know that over the coming weeks Karen will be meeting with a number of colleagues and getting her face known around the organisation, so be sure to say a big ‘Hello’!!  Karen will initially be taking some time to get to know our team, our partners across the system and giving some thought to how we continue on our journey of excellence.

The Board and I are looking forward to working with Karen and I am sure you will all join me in giving Karen a fabulous Team Derian welcome and getting to know her over the coming months.

Regards,

Karen Swindley
Chair of Trustees

Hi All,

Following my recent update, I am now delighted to announce that Karen Edwards will be joining us as the new Chief Executive of Derian House Children’s Hospice.

Karen, who previously held the role of Chief Executive of Bolton Lads & Girls Club, will be joining the team in February and said “I’m delighted to be joining the team at Derian House and be a part of the amazing services the charity provides. I’m looking forward to leading the team through the next chapter.”

As you already know, our current Chief Executive, David Robinson will be leaving Derian House at the end of the year but he said “I wish Karen every success in taking over the reins and leading Derian House forward from the amazing place we have taken it to.”

Lynn Grayson, Director of Clinical Services will be deputising between David’s departure and Karen’s start date and I’m sure we will all support Lynn to maintain our fantastic services to our children and young people and their families.

Thank you to those staff who helped with the recruitment process, your input was valuable to us when making a decision. Thank you also for your patience in awaiting the outcome of our interviews, I know you were all keen to find out who our new Chief Exec would be.

More details will follow and a public announcement will be made next week.

I hope you will join me in welcoming Karen to the team in 2023 and wishing David all the very best for a long and happy retirement.

Kind regards,

Karen Swindley
Chair of Trustees

Dear Colleague,

Our Trustee Board meeting took place on the 22^nd September 2022, at which Dawn updated the Board on the annual Forget-Me-Not service held in the spring. After a gap of three years the feedback from families has been quite overwhelming, with over 200 family attendees. The Board were impressed with the impact this activity has and thanked everyone involved for their support in making it happen.

We continue to look at the options for progressing further developments at Derian House, ensuring this is aligned with our strategy, regional demand and prevalence. We have an Away Day with the Senior Management Team at the end of September to progress things and when we have more detail, we will share.

As we stated in April, we committed to review the previously agreed cost of living pay rise when changes to pay within the NHS were announced. The Board discussed this at the meeting and approved a proposal from the senior team to offer a further increase of 1.5%, which will be backdated to April 2022; it therefore represents an increase of 4.5% for 2022. David will e-mail you all very soon to confirm the full details of this additional award but I hope this goes some way to recognise the value we place on you all and will be a little help with the challenges we are all currently facing with the cost of living.

We have now been presented with the Birdsong results and are delighted to see such a positive response to the questions. It is truly great to see such an improvement! I am delighted to let you know that for this survey round we were included in benchmarking, not just nationally but also with closer colleagues across Great Manchester Hospices, and the Board are proud to share that Derian House performs at the highest level compared to our peer group. Ben will share the report and other Birdsong information shortly.

It is good to see that we are maintaining strong income levels for the first eight months of the year and the Board recognises the excellent work in securing our income whilst keeping costs under control. At this challenging time for everyone it is vital we maintain a financially secure charity for all those who use or work for us.

The year of 2022 has been challenging, however with the amazing Derian Team spirit we are confident you will continue to provide the very best care for all those families who need us so much.

The Board would like to thank everyone for their continued commitment and hard work.

Karen Swindley

Chair of Trustees