Non-executive directors

Charles has been Joint Chairman for Guy’s and St Thomas’ and King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trusts since December 2022.

He is former Chair of both the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity, roles he held between 2016 and 2022.

Charles has had a long and distinguished career working at board level across a number of different sectors, including very senior leadership roles at NM Rothschild and GE Capital Europe. He is Chairman of VIVID Housing, a leading housing association and housing development company in south England.

He is a strong supporter of the arts and has served as the lead non-executive director at the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. He spent 6 years volunteering with Trinity Hospice, providing support to patients and families at the end of life. He was made a CBE in 2022 for his services to culture and health.

He has a passion for the NHS and a strong desire to support our local communities. He aims to use his connections to the life sciences sector and extensive leadership and commercial experience to support our organisations to continue to provide exceptional care to patients.

Sally joined the Board in February 2021 having been a non-executive director and Chair at Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust.

She became a life peer in 2001.

She has served as Minister of State in the Cabinet Office, Political Secretary to the Prime Minister and Director of Government Relations at 10 Downing Street, Chair of OFSTED and board member of the Olympic Delivery Authority.

Sally is Master of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, a post she has held since 2019. Sally chairs the Royal Brompton and Harefield Clinical Group Board.

Felicity joined the Board in September 2016.

She has considerable senior leadership and national and international strategic planning experience. She was Director General for Public and International Health until her retirement from the civil service in June 2016. Before that, Felicity was Director of the Prime Minister's Delivery Unit.

After qualifying in medicine in 1980 at St Bartholomew's Medical College, London, she completed an international MBA. Her previous roles include private secretary to the Chief Medical Officer, and head of the Medicines, Pharmacy and Industry Group at the Department of Health.

After her retirement Felicity became a member of the Independent Oversight and Advisory Committee for WHO Health Emergencies (IOAC), and has been its Chair since 2018. She is also:

• a visiting professor at the Institute of Global Health, Imperial College, London
• a non-executive director of Mediclinic International plc, an international private healthcare services group, and of Halcyon Topco Ltd (Sciensus Group)

Miranda joined the Trust on 1 January 2023.

She is a business expert, board advisor, investor and philanthropist across many sectors. She is also a multi award-winning diversity, inclusion and sustainability champion.

She has nearly 30 years of national and international experience in a variety of services including financial, law, charity and health.

Miranda has wide ranging experience as a Non-Executive Director.

Before joining the Bar of England and Wales as a barrister and senior banking lawyer she worked as an investment banker.

She has served as an equality commissioner for Lambeth Council and is President and Board Chair of The Miranda Brawn Diversity Leadership Foundation. Miranda is also a Senior Visiting Fellow at the University of Oxford lecturing, mentoring and researching The Brawn Review on boardroom sustainability and inclusion.

Nilkunj joined the Trust on July 1 2023. 

He brings diverse experience as an executive and non-executive director, having worked across the technology, healthcare, and telecommunications sectors. Until recently, he served as a non-executive director at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, a position he held since November 2015.

Previously, Nilkunj was regional director of McKinsey & Company's health strategy and systems practice. He also served as a non-executive director at Epsom and St. Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust and chaired the South West London Elective Orthopaedic Centre (SWLEOC).

Currently, Nilkunj is an executive at Oracle, where he channels his passion for health technology, digitally enabled transformation, and the utilisation of data to enhance patient care and support caregivers. He holds an MBA from INSEAD and is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

Nilkunj chairs the Audit and Risk committee and is a member of the Finance, Commercial, and Investments committee.

Simon joined the Board in February 2021, having been a non-executive director at Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust since August 2017.

Simon was a chartered accountant and partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC), where his career spanned more than 30 years. He has a depth of expertise in finance and audit, as well as a thorough understanding of governance across a range of sectors, technical rigour and board experience at the highest level.

Simon is also:

• a trustee at Jewish Care, a charity providing residential and day care facilities
• a member of council at the Royal Academy of Arts
• non-executive director of Bevan Brittan LLP a national law firm
• a non-executive director of Otsuka Pharmaceutical Europe Limited

Simon chairs the finance, commercial and investment committee.

Deirdre joined the Trust on 1 July 2023.

She has non-executive experience on the boards of a number of healthcare bodies including the Care Quality Commission, the General Medical Council, NHS Blood and Transplant, the Health Research Authority and the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust.

She is also a professor of paediatric hepatology at the University of Birmingham and Consultant Paediatric Hepatologist at Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. She set up the Paediatric Liver Unit at Birmingham Women’s and Children's Hospital which provides a national and international service for children with liver failure and undergoing liver and small bowel transplantation.

She is currently the National Clinical Lead for the Paediatric Hepatitis C Operational Delivery Network.

Javed joined the Board in February 2021 having been a non-executive director at Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust.

He was Chief Executive of the charity Barnardo's and is a leading figure in the UK public and voluntary sectors. Javed regularly advises government ministers, and is a high- profile contributor in the media and at national and international conferences.

Javed has also been a member of the advisory board for the Children's Commissioner for England and the governing body of Hounslow Clinical Commissioning Group. He is Chair designate of the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care Board and a member of the Government's Grenfell Recovery Taskforce.

Pauline joined the Trust on 1 July 2023.

She has experience working in Board-level roles across the NHS, including as Chief Executive at Luton and Dunstable NHS Foundation Trust. From 2002 to 2010, she was the Executive Director responsible for Patient Safety at the World Health Organisation.

Since 2016, she has been NHS England’s National Director for Emergency and Elective Care working closely with Government, the service, and a wide range of stakeholders.

Pauline also has non-executive experience - she is presently Chair of Beaumont Hospital in Dublin and Chair of Lifebox, a global non-profit organisation that she co-founded with the aim of making surgery and anaesthesia safer worldwide.

Ian joined the Trust following the merger with Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust. He joined Royal Brompton and Harefield in 2020 as a non-executive director.

He has been a senior executive with over 30 years' experience across the public and private sector. His previous roles include interim chief executive of the Government Property Agency, where he was asked by the Cabinet Office to set up and manage central Government's £3bn office, warehouse and science estate.

He was also a group property director of Kingfisher PLC where he set the strategy for their capital investment programme and retail distribution portfolio of 1,000 stores across ten countries. 

Ian has also been a member of the board of HM Courts and Tribunals Service and the Queen Victoria Hospital NHS Foundation Trust in East Grinstead.

Reza joined the Board in May 2016.

He is Vice President and Vice-Principal of research at King's College London (KCL). He was Director of the Medical Engineering Centre of Research Excellence at KCL, funded by the Wellcome Trust and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.

Reza is also a children's cardiologist at Evelina London Children's Hospital. He helped to establish our cardiovascular MRI service and developed the world's first cardiovascular MRI cardiac catheterisation programme.

He is also Director of the London Medical Imaging and AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare funded by Innovate UK and Office for Life Sciences.