Our Chair, Lesley Spaven

Lesley has had a long career in local government holding a number of roles in social housing, performance management and children’s social care before joining MVDA in August 2014 where she now leads a team focused on development support and volunteering for the local voluntary and community sector.

Lesley Spaven

Vice Chair- Dr Ian Holtby

Dr. Holtby has extensive medical experience, having worked in hospitals in Leeds, Middlesbrough and even Nigeria and, as a GP in Redcar. However, the greater part of his professional life was spent in public health, even returning to this post-retirement to assist in the response to the Covid-19 pandemic in the Hartlepool area. Following his retirement and on hearing of the creation of Healthwatch, he decided to put his knowledge of the NHS in the Teesside area to good use by volunteering his time as a member of the South Tees Healthwatch Board. This has enabled his input into the work needed to improve health service provision for the benefit of our local communities.

Ian Holtby

Board Member - Carole Marshall

Carole has spent the past 10 years engaging with the local community, and has previously worked as a Community Engagement Officer for Healthwatch South Tees. Carole fully understands the challenges of navigating our health and care system and the importance of involving people that can influence change in our local area.

After I had moved on in my career, I felt that I could still continue my support with Healthwatch as a board member as I have always been passionate about the local community and want to ensure people using health and care services still have a voice. I believe it is very important as often people don’t know who to turn to or who can listen to and respond to their views and experiences.

I am really interested in empowering people to have their voices heard, and I will continue to be an advocate for better health and care services in South Tees, being a part of Healthwatch gives a voice to those who may not be able to do so!

Carole Marshall

Board Member - Laura Bush

I began my journey as a Youth Worker in a deprived ward of Middlesbrough over 15 years ago and am now a Senior Manager at a Regional Charity (Youth Focus North East) that has the mission to improve the lives of young people. I have worked with young people facing a range of challenges to support them in programmes such as regional youth voice groups, open access, participation workshops etc. I now have the pleasure of managing a team of youth workers who are just as passionate about young people and get to support them in their role. I am passionate about working with others to create a better place for young people to grow and thrive. I have recently developed a new training centre and am working to expand this to offer more training opportunities for youth workers in the North East and wider. I believe that more youth workers are needed in more places to support young people and I am keen to get more people who are passionate about young people to join the sector.

I became a HWST Board Member in Oct 2023. I knew about Healthwatch South Tees through my work and believe in the work Healthwatch is trying to achieve. I want to support the development of health service provision for the benefit of the local communities and ensure young people’s voices are heard.

Laura Bush

Our Board

  • Jen Little
  • Louise Wheatley

Healthwatch South Tees (HWST) has the following legislative powers:

  • To ‘Enter and View’ specific types of premises where care and services are provided.
  • To ask for information and expect a response within a specific timescale.
  • To make recommendations to service commissioners and providers and expect a response within a specific timescale.
  • To refer matters to the relevant Overview and Scrutiny Committee (OSC) and expect a response.
  • To alert the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to concerns about specific care providers.

Overarching objectives

HWST will:

  • Fulfil its statutory duties and functions, holding providers and commissioners of health and care services to account.
  • Operate as stated in The Health and Social Care Act 2012, embedded in local communities.
  • Act as a local consumer champion, representing the collective voice of patients, service users, carers and the public through its statutory seat on the Health and Wellbeing Board and providing robust challenge and scrutiny in the interests of the citizens of South Tees.
  • Exercise real influence on commissioners, providers, regulators and Healthwatch England, using its knowledge of what matters most to local people.
  • Report concerns about the quality of local health and care services to the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
  • Provide information to patients and public who need to access health and care services promoting informed choice.
  • Support individuals to get information and independent advocacy if they need help to complain about health and care services.
  • Build on and utilise existing networks, knowledge, skills and services in support of local Healthwatch rather than duplicate what is already in place.

Past Board papers

We make the papers for our Board meetings available online. We also publish a summary of what was discussed. Check out our past meetings to read more. If you require documents from previous Board meetings, please contact us.

Find out more

Governance Documents

Code of Conduct

Communication Strategy

Terms of Reference

Decision Making Policy

Conflict of Interest

Compliments, Comments and

Expression of Interest

Board Recruitment Pack