Lancashire & South Cumbria NHS Foundation Trust

Abigail Harrison

Chief Digital, Infrastructure and Improvement Officer

Abigail is the Chief Digital, Infrastructure and Improvement Officer at Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS Foundation Trust (LSCFT) and Vice Chair of the Digital Health Chief Information Officer (CIO) Advisory Panel. She is passionate about transforming health and care for all people by harnessing technology and data and using a methodologically driven approach to improve the way we deliver services. She is an advocate for clinical leadership and co-design with patients, providing the space for staff, patients and technical teams to work together to generate and test ideas, challenge the status quo, and innovate. Over 20 years in the NHS, Abigail has worked alongside some of the world’s leading healthcare improvers and thought leaders and developed partnerships with industry, academia and health and social care to deliver change demonstrating that it is possible to get the basics right, deliver a safe infrastructure, whilst radically transforming services and creating the conditions for digital innovation. At LSCFT Abigail has Executive responsibility for digital, estates, health and safety, improvement and health inequalities. For four years prior to LSCFT she was the Chief Information Officer(CIO) at the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) where she led the teams to significantly improve digital maturity. Before NWAS Abigail spent 10 years working in improvement and innovation in Salford. During this time, she worked regionally and nationally to deliver national measurement systems, large scale change programmes and provide support to teams testing innovative solutions to some of the biggest challenges across the NHS.

Dominic McKenna

Chief Finance Officer

Dominic has been with the Trust since its inception, originally as financial management director and more latterly as director of operational finance with additional responsibility for contracts and procurement. Dominic assumed Interim chief finance officer status from 1 November 2022. Previous experience for the Trust has been gained from being part of the team which established the Trust and was also heavily involved in the Trust assuming Foundation status and the Transforming Community Services project. Prior to Lancashire Care, Dominic was employed by Guild Community Healthcare having entered the NHS as a Regional Trainee. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountants (CPFA).

Donna Robinson

Chief Operating Officer

Donna began her career as a registered mental health nurse, advancing to become a specialist community mental health practitioner. Donna has more than 30 years of experience in mental health and addiction services. In 2005, Donna transitioned into the operational leadership of mental health services, overseeing a diverse and complex portfolio in inner-city Liverpool, with more recent responsibilities including mental health services in secure environments as well as physical health services across a large geographical area. She is an experienced operational leader with a focus on the delivery of excellent care to communities, capacity, flow and zero out of area placements and a strong advocate for advancing the digital agenda to empower clinicians to prioritise patient care. Donna is passionate about ensuring parity for individuals who experience mental ill health and equitable access to services for all. She holds a master's degree alongside numerous postgraduate qualifications.

Dr Gareth Thomas

Chief Medical Officer / Deputy Chief Executive

Dr Gareth Thomas is a consultant psychiatrist for older people. Gareth has held a number of senior leadership roles including deputy chief medical officer, network medical director for the Fylde Coast, director of medical education and has held senior roles in continuous improvement. He has three Masters degrees in psychiatry, clinical education and medical leadership and has completed the Nye Bevan Programme. He is an experienced medical leader and team player who is fully committed to developing an improvement and learning culture, improving staff experience and developing a high quality, inclusive and patient centred approach within the organisation and across boundaries with partners in the system.

Oliver Soriano

Chief Nurse Officer

Oliver is an internationally educated nurse from the Philippines, who started working in the NHS in 1998. As a dual registered nurse, he is passionate for ensuring that service users receive a holistic care focused on both their physical and mental wellbeing. He has an extensive experience working in crisis mental health services as well as in specialist areas including older adults, perinatal and eating disorder pathways. He advocates in supporting the career and professional growth of his colleagues and supports the workforce to be well equipped, well skilled in delivering the best care for the patient and the community that we serve. He places high importance on the voice of our service users and carers to improve how we deliver care as well as identifying innovation through co-production.

Phil Horner

Chief Strategy and Performance Officer

Rob Cragg

Chief People Officer

Rob joined the NHS in 2001 and has enjoyed a career spanning operational management, leadership and organisational development. Rob, throughout his career has helped trusts to focus on improvements to culture and inclusion, creating working environments that improve both staff and user experience alike. Rob's career has seen him work at local, regional and national level, as well as being fortunate to gain experience in both the private and academic sectors. Creating equity, enhancing well-being and improving staff recognition are Rob's personal drivers, consequently choosing to select to work across mental health and community services for most of the last decade. He was most recently deputy director of organisation development, education and inclusion at Southern Health NHSFT, a post he held for three years before joining LSCFT.

Anika Ephraim

Non-Executive Director

Anika commenced in the role of Non-Executive Director on 9 January 2023. She is currently serving her first term of office which will expire on 8 January 2026. She is an experienced NED within the charity and education sectors, and has an engineering background, graduating from the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) with a degree in Design and Manufacturing Engineering. The majority of her career has been spent working for international corporations in the energy and manufacturing sectors in the UK and overseas. Currently Anika is a governor with LTE Group and has an MBA from IE University (Madrid, Spain) and Brown University (Providence, USA). Anika is the Chair of the Charitable Trust Funds Committee.

Gail Briers

Non-Executive Director

Gail is a registered mental health nurse with over 40 years’ experience working within the NHS in a variety of clinical and leadership roles. She is also the Senior Independent Director and Vice Chair for Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Trust and prior to that, was the Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Executive within a neighbouring mental health and community Trust. Gail has also worked as a Non-Executive Director within the quality improvement organisation AQuA. Gail joined the Trust in December 2025 as the clinical Non-Executive Director and chair of the Board’s Quality Committee.

Lucinda McArthur

Non-Executive Director

Lucinda has over 20 years of experience in public health and senior NHS roles, including 13 years spent operating within Lancashire and South Cumbria. Now running her own company, she stood down from her role as senior advisor to NHS West Lancashire CCG in 2021, after five years in post. After just over a year as an associate of Public Health England’s Well North programme, Lucinda took up the role of CEO of its spin-off, Well North Enterprises, a position she held for nearly a year and a half, before leaving to spend more time with her young family. Her previous roles include consultant in/associate director of public health, NHS Central Lancashire PCT (2008 – 2013), public health network director, Cheshire and Merseyside Public Health Network (2007 – 2008) and public health specialist and teenage pregnancy strategy co-ordinator, Lambeth PCT (2004 – 2007). Lucinda lives near Northwich, Cheshire.

Phil Huggon

Chair of People and Culture Committee

Phil is a non-executive director with several organisations mostly in health and education across the private, charitable and public sectors. Originally from Preston, he graduated with a degree in Languages from Oriel College, Oxford, then spent 20 years in commercial, marketing and transformation roles with BP, MARS and Shell, both in the UK and across Europe. Over the last 13 years, he has held several NED roles with the NHS, and currently is chair of the NHS Transformation Unit, vice chair of Healthwatch England and NED with Liverpool Women’s Hospital (until March 2021). He has a particular focus on strategy and transformation.

Ruth Lowry

Chair of Audit Committee

Ruth was appointed to the board as a non-executive director in April 2021 and has chaired the Audit Committee since October 2021. She is a chartered accountant and spent the first half of her career with PricewaterhouseCoopers and its predecessor firms in London, the East Midlands and the North West. She specialised in public service audit and advisory work, working with a range of organisations including NHS providers, further and higher education institutions, housing associations and charities. From 2004 to 2022 she was Lancashire County Council’s head of internal audit and worked closely with both the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy and the Institute of Internal Auditors.

Stephen Watkins

Associate Non-Executive Director

Stephen began his career in central government with the National Audit Office before joining the NHS in 1988 to work in the finance function with South Manchester Health Authority. He is a qualified accountant and has spent most of his career working as a senior advisor to the health and care sector. For over 30 years, Stephen has worked in the healthcare consultancy industry including roles with Price Waterhouse and Hoskyns/Cap Gemini. From 2000 until 2022 he was the founding director of Benchmark Management Consulting, which also included a role acting as director of the NHS Benchmarking Network. The NHS Benchmarking Network is one of the world's largest healthcare comparison services and Stephen led a range of work programmes including a national and international mental health analytics service. Stephen has advised mental health policy departments in all 4 UK countries and collaborated with 17 countries on mental health analytics and policy as well as working with international organisations such as the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and International Initiative for Mental Health Leadership (IIMHL).

Steve Wilson

Deputy Trust Chair and Chair of Finance and Performance Committee

An Accountant, Steve is the treasurer of Greater Manchester Combined Authority, a position he has held since the end of 2019, managing the authority’s annual revenue budgets of £1.7bn and capital programme of £0.5bn. For the two years leading up to the creation of the Greater Manchester Integrated Care Board earlier this year, Steve also covered the Greater Manchester Integrated Care System finance director role. Steve has been trustee of St Ann’s Hospice since 2018 and lives in Manchester.