Governing Body members
Annie Topping
Executive Director of Nursing, Quality and Patient Safety
Annie is a registered nurse and joined the CCG in 2015. She has over 30 years of clinical and managerial experience gained from a wide range of commissioning and provider organisations, including GP practices, foundation trusts and Healthwatch. Annie's portfolio includes service quality and patient safety, child and adult safeguarding, and infection prevention and control. Annie is passionate about health and racial equity, and is the NHE England and Improvement North East & Yorkshire region strategic lead for the Chief Nursing Officer's BME Action Plan. Annie is also a member of the Florence Nightingale Foundation International Nurse Expert Curriculum and Project Working Group. Annie holds a LLM (Master of Laws) in medical law degree.Mark Adams
Accountable Officer
Mark is the Chief Officer of the Newcastle Gateshead, North Tyneside and Northumberland Clinical Commissioning Groups. He is also a lead for the North of Tyne and Gateshead ICP. Mark started his career in the private sector working for technology and software development organisations. Prior to joining the NHS he held the post of Head of Professional Services for an enterprise systems and software provider working throughout Europe, the Middle East and Asia. He joined the NHS in the provider sector where he was Director of Surgical and Clinical Support Services at Southmead Health Services NHS Trust before moving back the North East to take up commissioning appointments. Mark was the Director of Commissioning for NHS North of Tyne prior to taking up his current CCG Chief Officer roles. Mark retains a keen interest in digital and AI development, particularly in respect of the opportunities that it offers to empower patients and facilitate the delivery of more effective and efficient care.Dr Graham Syers
Clinical Chair
Graham is a GP partner at Alnwick Medical Group, having worked at The Bondgate Practice in Alnwick since 1998. During that time he was initially a GP trainer and then worked as a GP with a special interest in musculoskeletal medicine. Outside the practice he chaired the North Locality Practice Based Commissioning Group until the inception of the CCG in 2013 when he was appointed as North Locality Director. During his time with the CCG he has developed his role as Prescribing Lead and is currently Vice Chair of the North Tyneside, Gateshead and North Cumbria Area Prescribing Committee and Chairs the North East and North Cumbria Prescribing Forum.Siobhan Brown
Chief Operating Officer
Siobhan has worked in healthcare for over 25 years, the majority of this time has been working for the NHS; but she also spent as a number of years working in the South African and New Zealand health systems. Siobhan’s work roles have covered provider management within acute hospitals, primary and community settings, as well as mental health and learning disability services. In 2013 Siobhan joined the CCG as Transformation Director, she was later appointed as Chief Operating Officer in 2018. Siobhan’s areas of particular interest include the delivery of care in rural settings, delivering health outcomes through effective whole system working; and looking ahead, working closely with the population to co-design future models of care and self-care.Jon Connolly
Chief Finance Officer
Jon joined the CCG in February 2019 as Chief Finance Officer, which is a joint role between Northumberland and North Tyneside CCG. Jon began his career with the Audit Commission, joining the NHS in 2007. He has held senior finance positions in a number of NHS organisations. These include spells as finance director at South Tees Hospitals NHS FT, Gateshead Healthcare NHS FT and most recently NHS England (Cumbria and the North East).Dr John Warrington
Medical Director - Central Locality Director, business director for finance and performance and director for planned care
John trained locally as a GP and has been working as a GP for fifteen years, currently in Cramlington and Seaton Delaval. He has been involved with commissioning in Northumberland for over ten years and was previously the practice-based commissioning lead for both the Blyth Valley locality and Northumberland. John also sat on the Professional Executive Committee for NHS North of Tyne and has been a long-standing member of the Northumberland Local Medical Committee.Dr Robin Hudson
Medical Director
Robin has been a practising GP for 20 years and has previously been a GP trainer and postgraduate GP tutor. He has worked for the CCG since 2013 and was clinical director for the Northumberland PACS Vanguard programme from 2015-2018. In addition to chairing the clinical management board he oversees primary care development and assurance, learning disabilities, mental health and children’s’ services. He is also the Macmillan GP cancer lead. He is passionate about developing the population health agenda in Northumberland.Dr Paula Batsford
Blyth Valley Locality Director and clinical lead for long term conditions and adult mental health
Paula trained to be a GP in Yorkshire. She moved with her family to Northumberland 14 years ago and has been working as a GP here since then. She currently is a GP partner in a practice in Cramlington. Paula’s main clinical focus within the CCG is on improving the detection, management and outcomes of long term medical conditions and adult mental health conditions and ensuring that individuals with these problems overall health and wellbeing is the optimum that can be achieved. She also is a Locality Director for Blyth Valley and is focused on the quality and sustainability of General Practice and ensuring good engagement between the GP practices and the CCG. Paula is also a GP appraiser, a role she has been involved with for the last 9 years.Dr Ben Frankel
West Locality Director - Clinical lead for Newcastle pathways, demand management and contract
Ben qualified at Newcastle Medical School in 2000 having completed a Masters in public health in 1996. He has been a partner at The Sele Medical practice in Hexham since 2008. Alongside his core GP work Ben teaches medical students, conducts research and carries out minor surgery. More recently, he provided a vasectomy service for patients in Northumberland. Ben joined the CCG in late 2017 before becoming Locality Director for the West in May 2018.Dr Chris Waite
Joint North Locality Director
Chris has been a GP for 18 years. He is currently a GP working in Felton & Widdrington. Chris trains Medical Students as well as Doctors in their Foundation years and on the GP training scheme. He shares the role of North Locality Director with Tony Brown. Chris is Clinical lead for the CCG Medicines Optimisation Group.Tony Brown
Joint North Locality Director
Tony joined the CCG in 2019 as Joint Locality Director for North Northumberland, leading on future workforce planning and primary care development around the county. Previously a commercial manager in the Railway, Telecoms and Finance sector, he has worked in NHS management roles since 2008 and is currently Managing Partner at Alnwick Medical Group.Paul Turner
Director of Contracting and Commissioning
Paul has worked in the NHS for the last 14 years at regional, national and local level and brings significant commissioning knowledge and expertise; having held several senior commissioning positions over the last 10 years at a large Primary Care Trust and more recently at Northumberland CCG.Janet Guy
Lay Chair
Janet spent her professional career as a solicitor practising in Northumberland and Tyneside, initially in family and criminal law and more recently in probate, wills and trusts. Over the past twenty years she has worked at board level in the public sector, gaining considerable experience in the field of corporate governance in health, policing, probation and education. She has also worked with a variety of voluntary organisations. Janet is also an independent member of the Northumbria Police and Crime Panel, a Trustee of Victims First Northumbria and sits as a lay member on disciplinary panels.Karen Bower
Lay Governor for Corporate Finance and Patient and Public Engagement
Karen started out as a primary teacher before moving to local authority to work as a science and technology advisory teacher. She gained a headship in a first school in Blyth, successfully steering the school through the newly introduced Ofsted inspection regime before moving south. After a series of advisory and school improvement roles, which included work with school governing bodies, Karen returned to Newcastle as a senior adviser. She took early retirement from her senior officer role as Head of School Improvement for early years and primary education, Newcastle City Council and since then has gained experience in a number of organisations in the voluntary sector. She is currently serving her third term of office on the CCG Governing Body.Stephen Brazier
Lay Governor for Audit and Conflicts of Interests
Since 1996 Stephen has worked as a finance professional within a large central government department. Prior to this he trained at KPMG, undertaking audits, as junior, senior and audit manager. After leaving KPMG he undertook a number of private sector roles, principally within financial services. He is a chartered accountant and has extensive experience in the public and private sector.Prof Marios Adamou
