Webinar: What does the Spending Review mean for the NHS, social care and public health?

Anita Charlesworth is the Director of Research and the REAL Centre (Research and Economic Analysis for the Long term) at the Health Foundation, and Honorary Professor in the College of Social Sciences at the Health Services Management Centre (HSMC) at the University of Birmingham. 

Anita is a health economist and has a background in government and public policy. Before joining the Health Foundation in May 2014, she was Chief Economist at the Nuffield Trust from 2010–14, where she led the Trust’s work on health care financing and market mechanisms. Prior to that she had roles as Chief Analyst and Chief Scientific Advisor at DCMS (2007–10), Director of Public Spending at the Treasury (1998–2007), and worked as an Economic Advisor at the Department of Health and for SmithKline Beecham pharmaceuticals. 

She has worked as a non-executive director in the NHS – for Islington PCT (2007–2011) and The Whittington Hospital (2011–2016). 

Anita was specialist advisor to the House of Lords' Select Committee on the long-term sustainability of the NHS in 2016/17, and has recently been appointed as an expert adviser for the Health and Social Care Select Committee and also sits on the expert and advisory panel for the Independent Review of Criminal Legal Aid. Anita is Chair of the OHE Policy Committee (2020) and is also a Commissioner for The Lancet Global Health Commission on Financing Primary Health Care. 

Anita has an MSc in Health Economics from the University of York. She is a Trustee for Tommy’s, the baby charity, and also a Trustee for the Office of Health Economics. She was awarded a CBE in The Queen's 2017 Birthday Honours List for Services to Economics and Health Policy.

Saffron is NHS Providers deputy chief executive. She has extensive experience in policy development, influencing and communications and has worked in the healthcare sector since 2007. Before moving into healthcare, Saffron was head of public affairs at the Local Government Association, the voice of local councils in England. Her early career focused on influencing EU legislation and policy development, and she started working life in adult and community education. 

She has a degree in Modern Languages from the University in Manchester, for ten years was a board member and then chair of a 16–19 college in Hampshire and is a trustee of GambleAware, a leading charity committed to minimising gambling-related harm. 

David Finch is Assistant Director in the Healthy Lives directorate.

David joined the Health Foundation in May 2018 and currently leads a programme of work developing policy and analysis related to the wider determinants of health. His work focuses the role that social and economic policy and business can play in improving health, and understanding the influence that health has on social and economic outcomes of people and places.

Previously David worked for the Resolution Foundation as a Senior Fellow working on a range of issues including tax and benefit policy with a focus on Universal Credit, calculating the Living Wage, demographics, pensions and pay progression.

Prior to this, he worked as an Economic Adviser at the Department for Work and Pensions on areas including childcare and state pensions. David studied Economics at the University of Sussex.

Sarah Pickup is the Deputy Chief Executive of the Local Government Association (LGA). Sarah previously worked for Hertfordshire County Council as Deputy Chief Executive with responsibility for corporate services as well as being the county’s chief finance officer.  Until her appointment to this role in May 2013, Sarah was Director of Health & Community Services in Hertfordshire and she had held this role since 2003.

Sarah is on the board of Hightown Housing Association, an independent member of the Home Office Adult and Risk Assurance Committee and a Trustee of a local arts centre. She was president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) in 2012/13, and prior to this fulfilled a number of roles for the association.  In 2014 she was awarded an OBE for services to social care.

Sarah graduated from Sussex University with a degree in Economics and is a member of CIPFA.

Hugh is Head of Policy at the Health Foundation.

Hugh joined the Health Foundation in 2018. He leads the Foundation’s policy team, which works to analyse, understand, and inform national policies on health and social care in England.

Before he joined the Health Foundation, Hugh was a Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy and Practice at the University of California, San Francisco, and Berkeley. Hugh’s research in the US focused on health system approaches to addressing patients’ social and economic needs, like unstable housing and food insecurity.

Before that, Hugh worked at The King’s Fund as Senior Policy Adviser to the Chief Executive, where he published research and policy analysis on a range of topics, including national NHS reforms, integration of health and social care services, and opportunities for health systems to improve population health. He also provided policy advice to the NHS and government.

Hugh has also worked as a management consultant at PwC, working on health policy and improvement, and on Sir John Oldham’s Independent Commission on Whole Person Care.