Publish date: 23 May 2025
Shared chair appointment for North East NHS Trusts
Gateshead Health Foundation Trust, Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals Foundation Trust and Northumbria Healthcare Foundation Trust have appointed Sir Paul Ennals CBE as a shared chair across all three organisations.
The appointment is part of a new collaborative working arrangement known as the Great North Healthcare Alliance (which also includes North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust) which collectively cares for 1.3 million patients over 4,600 square miles. Alliance partners employ 40,000 staff and have an annual budget of around £3.4 billion.
By working together more closely, the NHS can deliver significant benefits to patients and staff within each organisation and across the region.
Sir Paul is currently the chair of Northumbria Healthcare and interim chair of Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals Foundation Trust but will now take up the formal shared chair responsibilities for all three trusts.
Sir Paul brings vast leadership experience from large, complex organisations at both a national and local level. His experience ranges from chief executive roles with successful national organisations to chairing influential multi-agency partnerships over a 25-year period.
His professional career has been spent largely within services for vulnerable children and adults, mainly based in London, particularly leading national children’s organisations. This included playing a key role in steering the Government’s Every Child Matters programme during the 2000s.
Now based in North Tyneside, he was awarded a CBE in 2002 for services to children with special educational needs and was knighted in 2009 for services to children.
In previous years he has chaired 6 multi-agency safeguarding boards for children and vulnerable adults, holding the relevant hospital trusts and other agencies to account for their safeguarding activity.
Sir Paul Ennals CBE said: "It is such a privilege to lead three amazing organisations in the North East and by working together even more closely we can make a huge difference. I am excited by this new role and firmly believe that by greater collaboration, sharing ideas and coming together with a single voice we can improve the lives of our patients, communities and staff.
"I have long believed there are huge opportunities to improve the integration of health and care services and by taking on this wider role across three areas I think we are taking a big step forward. While this work will bring us together on some key issues it is important we understand the vital role each organisation plays locally and that is why they will remain independent organisations in each area.
"I look forward to working with new colleagues and meeting staff and patients across Northumberland, North Tyneside, Gateshead and Newcastle."
The Shared Chair will support the development of a single, unified voice for the organisations, making decision-making more streamlined and increasing the strategic influence of the Alliance regionally and nationally.
Speaking jointly, the three foundation trust chief executives - Birju Bartoli, Trudie Davies and Rob Harrison - said: "This is the start of an exciting new era of greater collaboration which will see us develop and deliver plans that will bring some real benefits to local people. We look forward to working with Sir Paul on the priorities within our own organisations while also building on the strong existing collaboration and partnerships that will have a tangible impact on the communities we serve."
Sir Paul will take up the formal shared chair responsibilities for Newcastle and Northumbria from the start of July, and then for Gateshead once their current chair, Alison Marshall’s, term ends at the end of September 2025.
You can find out more about the Great North Health Alliance at www.greatnorthhealthcare.nhs.uk