Driving better health through English devolution

Exploring the role of Strategic Authorities

Sam Atwell is Policy and Research Manager at the Health Foundation, covering health, work and the welfare system and supported the Commission for Healthier Working Lives. Prior to the Health Foundation, he was Head of Operations at the Institute for the Future of Work and a Teaching Fellow in Economics at Harvard University. 

Pooja Ahluwalia is the Senior Policy Officer for Health and Place at the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA). In her role, Pooja focuses on embedding health considerations into the wider determinants of health—such as housing and spatial planning—by influencing strategy and policy development across departments. Pooja works collaboratively across the WMCA with the goal of making health a core component of regional decision-making.

Samantha is an experienced NHS Chief Executive and joined the North East and North Cumbria to set up the ICB in January 2022.  In addition to her NHS career, which spans nearly 30 years, Sam is also the National Director for Management and Leadership at NHS England and Chair of the Health and Care Women Leaders Network for NHS Confederation. 

Dr. Ajaz is the Head of Health at the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA), where he leads efforts to put health and wellbeing at the heart of regional policy. As executive health lead and advisor to the Mayor, he champions a "health in all policies" approach, making the case that better housing, skills, transport and economic growth are central to improving population health and tackling inequalities.

He has led negotiations with government on health devolution, pressing for greater local powers to shape services and outcomes. His work also brings partners together across the system—NHS, local government, business, and communities—to design more integrated approaches to health, employment, and wellbeing. From mental health commissions and workplace wellbeing programmes, to pilots linking health and employment, his focus is on practical action that reflects local needs and voices.

Dr. Ajaz’s career spans more than 20 years across research, public health, and community-led programmes. Early roles supporting migrants in the U.S., cancer research and community genetics and working on minority health access in the UK shaped his commitment to inclusion. During the pandemic, he helped launch a local Community Champions programme to reduce COVID-19’s disproportionate impact on minority groups as well as develop a digital solution for early triage in the community to reduce pressure on the health system during the pandemic.

Today, he leads a national collaboration funded by the Health Foundation, demonstrating how Strategic Mayoral Authorities can use their levers to improve health and reduce inequalities. A passionate advocate for prevention, integration, and local leadership, Dr. Ajaz is helping to shape both regional delivery and national debate on the future of population health.

Amy is a Project Manager in Economic Development at Leeds City Council. Amy supports the development of Leeds Anchor Network, and works to connect Anchors to communities and community organisations in the city to increase the role of the network in improving outcomes in disadvantaged areas of the city. Amy is also responsible for Leeds Business Anchors and helped to establish the network in 2023 by bringing private sector businesses on board with the city’s Anchor approaches.

Jo Bibby is Director of Health at the Health Foundation.

Jo is responsible for leading the Foundation’s Healthy Lives strategy to create the opportunities for everyone to lead a healthy life.

Joining the Foundation in November 2007, Jo initially led the Foundation’s influential portfolio of work in patient safety and person-centred care.  

Jo has worked in health care at local and national level for 25 years, including 10 years at the Department of Health. As Head of NHS Performance, she oversaw the implementation of the policy agenda set out in the NHS Plan. At the NHS Modernisation Agency, Jo led an international quality improvement initiative – Pursuing Perfection.

Before joining the Foundation, Jo was the Director for the Calderdale and Kirklees Integrated Service Strategy where she led a major service reconfiguration programme to deliver improvements in quality, safety and patient experience.

She is a trustee at the Centre for Homelessness Impact and from June 2021 a non-executive director at Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust.

Jo has a PhD in Medical Biophysics.

David is the Snenior Fellow for Public Health and Inequalities at The King's Fund. Before joining the Fund, David worked at the Department of Health as deputy director for health inequalities. He managed the Labour government's PSA target on health inequalities and the independent Marmot Review of inequalities in health. While in the Department he worked on many policy areas – including on diabetes, long-term conditions, dental health, waiting times, the pharmaceutical industry, childhood obesity and choice and competition – as an economic and strategy adviser. He has also worked at Guy's Hospital, King’s College London and the Centre for Health Economics in York where his focus was on the economics of public health and behaviours and incentives.

Sally is Director of Public Health in Cambridgeshire, leading work across the life course to improve health and reduce health inequalities.   Prior to this role she was Director of Public Health in Luton where she led the work to become the first Marmot Town, focusing actions across the system to build health equity.

Oli is an Innovation Consultant working primarily on Innovation Unit’s health and care portfolio. In this role Oli leads delivery of the Health Anchors Learning Network (HALN), a UK-wide network for people responsible for, or interested in, anchor approaches in health, to share and learn from each other. Oli joined Innovation Unit from the social enterprise he co-founded and co-ran for 3 years, with a mission to better involve underserved communities in designing more inclusive health and wellbeing solutions.

Thom Dancox is a Policy Officer with the Mayoral Regions Programme, focused on advancing the Health in All Policies (HiAP) agenda across strategic authorities. 

Thom played a leading role in the research and development of the HiAP Toolkit for Mayoral Regional Authorities. He also created two interactive self-assessment tools designed to help strategic authorities evaluate their maturity and prioritisation of HiAP approaches. His current work focuses on expanding the suite of HiAP resources, including the development of an executive summary, a series of instructional videos, and sector-specific resource packs tailored to the needs of regional stakeholders. 

In addition to his work on HiAP, Thom’s professional interests include Inclusive Growth and the role of place-based policy in driving equitable outcomes across regions.

Max is CEO of Rotunda Ltd, an anchor organisation close to her heart having been a student of Rotunda in her early 20’s returning in 2009. During her 15-year tenure, Maxine has taken Rotunda from a position of grant dependency to sustainability, re-modelling the organisation to support over 2000 people a year with our unique offer of education, training and enabling services. Rotunda has grown from two to 30 members of staff, with 40 volunteers, a turnover of £1m+ and an investment of over £7.5m in our built assets, rescuing and restoring five Grade II listed buildings – the last of their kind in the area – placing them back into the hands of local people, for generations to come. 

Max continues to grow the depth and breadth of Rotunda’s offer in line with local need, with great focus on community cohesion in an area rich in community and culture which has experienced decades of economic neglect. Max platforms North Liverpool’s voice amongst decision makers in the Liverpool City Region, advocating tirelessly for meaningful change across key networks. 

Tom Lloyd Goodwin is Deputy Chief Executive at the Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES).

Lizi is an experienced policy consultant, having worked in social and economic policy in central government, parliament and public affairs. She Chairs our Employee Owned Trust Board, supporting the governance of Metro Dynamics as an independent company with a strong social purpose. Lizi's experience in government included designing local growth funding and programmes to tackle regional inequalities in the cities and local growth unit. She was previously a senior researcher for the former Shadow Health Secretary, and prior to that worked in health and NHS policy. 

Lizi applies experience in local economic and public service policy to support places to deliver inclusive growth and build great places to live and work. Recent projects at Metro Dynamics include supporting the development and implementation of devolution deals, developing investment opportunities in inclusive growth, and creating strategy for public-private economic collaboration in places. As a policy associate with the Growth and Reform Network and Future Governance Forum, Elizabeth collaborates with think tanks on devolution, public service reform, and regional economic growth policy. 

Following a decade of public health experience within academia and Local Authority delivery, Claire joined the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) in October 2023 as the Delivery Manager for the Mayoral Regions Programme (MRP). 

The MRP is 3-year programme funded by the Health Foundation that is being delivered by the WMCA in partnership with 9 other mayoral regional authorities across England. It aims to explore, support, and evidence the role of mayoral regional authorities in improving health and reducing inequalities. 

Claire leads the programme’s central team, which is driving action across member regions by providing direct support, catalysing collective influence, and adding capacity to partners through consultancy activity. The team is currently working with system partners on a range of key policy areas related to the wider determinants of health, including employment, housing, and devolution. The MRP has also recently published a first-of-its-kind Health in All Policies toolkit for mayoral regional authorities and is supporting its implementation and evaluation. 

Sam is the Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise Sector (VCSE) Lead for Bradford District and Craven Health and Care Partnership, which means advocating on behalf of the sector and helping to ensure that it is playing its optimal role in supporting the delivery of the partnership’s ambitions.

Sam is also CEO of the Voluntary Sector Alliance which she joined in January 2023, from Sport England.

She has a wealth of experience of working in the VCSE sector as well as working alongside communities, largely in the Bradford district and also throughout the North of England. She also has significant experience of working in local government, largely in change making roles, and has a passion for redressing inequalities and for social justice.

Sam is also chair of Key Fund, a social enterprise supporting VCSE organisations throughout the North of England and the Midlands through affordable loans and grant making. 

Katherine is an Assistant Director in the Healthy Lives at the Health Foundation. She leads work to support local and regional government to take action to tackle the wider determinants of health and reduce health inequalities.

Helen is GM Tripartite Agreement Director, working across Greater Manchester Combined Authority, NHS Greater Manchester and Greater Manchester Housing Provider Partnership. She leads the delivery of the joint strategy and partnership agreement owned by the three partners centred on addressing the interconnected issues between housing, health and growth to improve the health of GM residents. 

Rachel is a specialty registrar in public health in her final year of training, based in Yorkshire, where she has worked across a range of settings including local authorities, health protection, healthcare providers, the Office of Health Improvement and Disparities (at both a regional and national level), and most recently the West Yorkshire Combined Authority. Rachel is particularly interested in socioeconomic determinants and inequalities, place-making, healthcare inequalities, and using systems thinking and leadership to enable action on these. Rachel’s career has also included roles in public health intelligence, local government, and the civil service, with a focus on health policy, the wider determinants of health, and using evidence and intelligence to drive decision-making and population health improvements.