News / Finance leaders Flory and Douglas to step down

Mr Flory will be the first to go, standing down at the general election. He has spent more than 20 years at board level in the NHS, including national NHS deputy chief executive and director of finance and, for
the past three years, the first chief executive of the TDA.

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt said he valued Mr Flory’s ‘wise
counsel, advice and judgement’. He continued: ‘But most of all,
I have come to admire the values that lie underneath that ability: a real commitment to doing the right thing for patients and safer, more compassionate care.’

Mr Flory said the time was right for change. ‘It has been a great privilege to lead the NHS TDA over the past few years. We have a fantastic team, who are wholly focused on supporting NHS trusts to deliver in an environment that is pretty challenging for providers.’

Current TDA director of finance Bob Alexander will be acting chief executive, while deputy director of finance Elizabeth O’Mahony will step up to director.

Mr Douglas, who has served nine health secretaries as the Department’s finance director and in other senior roles over the past 19 years, is to retire at the end of May. David Williams, director general of finance at the Ministry of Defence, will succeed him on 1 April.

Mr Douglas said the general election marked a natural break. ‘I have had a fantastic time in this job and loved every minute of it. It has given me the opportunity to work with great people from the civil service, the NHS and politics, and hopefully make some small, positive difference to a service that I believe in passionately.’ Mr Hunt also paid tribute to Mr Douglas. ‘I have hugely valued his advice and guidance as we seek to make the NHS more compassionate, sustainable and safer than it has ever been,’ he said.