New chairman for the Trust

22 May 2000

Veronica Worrall has been appointed as the new chairman of the West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust.

A retired businesswoman, Mrs Veronica Worrall, 50, of Great Henny, near Sudbury has been appointed to the post by the Secretary of State for Health. She has been a Non-executive Director of the East Anglian Ambulance NHS Trust since August 1998.

Mrs Worrall has extensive management experience and was a senior executive of the NatWest Bank where she had worked for 28 years before leaving in 1997.

She has experience of strategic partnership negotiations, change management, continuous improvement strategies and staff development and evaluation. She holds a Master in Business Administration (MBA) and is also a Member of the Institute of Personnel and Development (MIPD).

At the ambulance trust Mrs Worrall was a member of the appointments and remuneration committee, complaints convener and assisted with the organisation's new HR and corporate strategies and business plan. She was also a representative on the National Sub Committee for Patient Transport Services.

Mrs Worrall is also the chairman of the Friends of St Mary's Church, Great Henny who achieved international media coverage when it launched an appeal to save its wooden tower from the ravages of woodpecker damage. She is a founder and former chairman of the marketing team for the British Ski Club for the Disabled.

"I have thoroughly enjoyed my time at the ambulance trust and now look forward to playing a greater role in the NHS," said Mrs Worrall who takes up her post on 15 May and her term of office ends on 31 October 2003. "The West Suffolk Hospitals Trust runs my local hospitals in Sudbury and Bury and I am delighted to have been selected to lead their Board.

"These are times of great opportunities in health care and I want to see the trust building on the excellent reputation that it has for delivering high quality services.”

Mrs Worrall succeeds Jeremy Richardson who retired from his post as chairman last month (April) after three and a half years due to pressure of other commitments.

Trust chief executive Johanna Finn said: "We look forward to Veronica joining the trust. The key role that we will be playing in training more doctors for the NHS through the new Cambridge Graduate Course makes this a particularly exciting time in our development."

Mrs Worrall will receive a remuneration of £17,625.00 a year - an amount set by the Department of Health. She has no declared political affiliation.