Speakers

Duncan Eaton - Chairman

Duncan is a Non Executive Director at BiP Solutions. Prior to this he was Chief Executive of NHS PASA, an organisation he had headed since its creation in 1999. He is a past President of CIPS and the Health Care Supply Association. In 2001 CIPS awarded him the Swinbank Medal for distinguished service to purchasing and supply. In 2005 Duncan was awarded the prestigious GO magazine Lifetime Achievement Award, in recognition of his contribution to the public procurement profession.

Neil Argyle - Chairman

Neil recently retired after a career spanning over 40 years in procurement, 31 of which were in the health care sector. After working in Trent and Oxford regions he became Divisional Supplies Manager in North West Thames in 1983, providing a procurement and logistics service to hospitals in Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. In 1991 the Division merged into East Anglia Regional Health Authority and he was appointed Director of Purchasing. Shortly afterwards, NHS Supplies was formed and Neil became National Purchasing Executive for the medical category. When NHS Supplies was disbanded and the NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency came into existence in 2000, Neil was appointed Director of Policy and Performance. His responsibilities included business planning, supplier relationships and communications, legal and procedural issues, the environment and emergency planning. In 2005 he was appointed Director of Pharmaceuticals, a position he held until taking early retirement at the end of 2006.

Andy Brown

Profile coming soon.

Bob Dredge

Bob is a Senior Fellow in Financial Management at Keele University and also has his own consulting firm. From 2001 to 2004 he was the Programme Manager for Financial Reforms at the Department of Health, where he led the team responsible for the initial design and implementation of Payment by Results. Bob has also worked as a Finance Director in the NHS and as an advisor to the House of Commons Select Committee on Health and to the Welsh Assembly Government. . He has worked with the private health care sector,pharmaceutical and medi-tech suppliers on the design and implementation of reimbursement policies. In addition, Bob works for the World Bank on health sector reforms in the Balkans and Central Asia and is a non executive to the Heart of Birmingham PCT.

David John

David has been CEO of the East of England NHS Collaborative Procurement Hub since its inception in 2007 and was one of the prime movers behind its creation. He is responsible for identifying, developing and implementing the business strategy in pursuit of the organisation’s agreed objectives. His career in procurement began in the public sector where he worked for a number of local authority purchasing consortia. David entered the commercial world with the Thomas Cook Group where he spent several years before joining the American-based Cendant Corp, whose extensive brand portfolio includes Avis, Ramada and Century 21 Real Estate. David joined the NHS in 2004, tasked with setting up the Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire Supply Confederation to pilot collaborative procurement in the East of England.

Beth Loudon

Business Development Manager, NHS Commercial Medicines Unit

Beth has managed the transition of the Pharmacy Unit of the erstwhile NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency (NHS PASA) into the NHS Commercial Unit. She now has responsibility for setting the strategic direction of the Unit and managing its response to the changing needs of the Department of Health and the NHS.

Beth is a BA (Hons) Business Studies and CIPS qualified procurement professional with 12 years’ public sector experience. The majority of her work has been in building collaborative procurement partnerships within the NHS to gain efficiencies and improvements in healthcare with NHS PASA. She was the Assistant Director of the North West Centre of Excellence, which achieved savings for local authorities through collaboration.

Beth was the elected Healthcare representative on the CIPS council for 3 years and has also been North West Branch Co-ordinator for the Health Care Supply Association.

Andrew Rudd

Andrew was  the Director of Procurement Enablement for the NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency (NHS PASA), part of the Department of Health. NHS PASA was responsible for purchasing and supply strategy for the English National Health Service (NHS) and also managed national contracts covering £3.2bn of the NHS’s £20bn total of non-pay expenditure. Andrew has 22 years’ NHS purchasing experience at local, regional and national level. At PASA he was the Director responsible for e-Procurement, sourcing and data analysis and programme and uptake management. His wider corporate responsibilities included performance, quality and information. Andrew has a Masters Degree from the University of Birmingham and is a member of both the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply and the Chartered Institute of Marketing.

Andy Taylor

Profile coming soon.

Simon Walsh

Simon is Head of Procurement and eCommerce at the Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The Trust has a £650m turnover, including a total non-pay spend of £250m, and is among the largest and most complex organisations in the NHS. Simon leads a team that provides a unified procurement and eCommerce service, including sourcing, materials management, electronic catalogue-based ordering and invoice payments. In 2009, Simon became Chairman of the Purchasing Board of the North East Patches Oracle Group. Simon has held a number of positions in both regional and locally based NHS Procurement across his 23 year career - all spent in the NHS.

John Warrington

John joined the NHS in 1984 to work in the West Midlands Regional Supplies Department. He worked in a number of purchasing roles in the West Midlands, Oxford and North West Regional Health Authorities before joining the National Purchasing Unit of the NHS Supplies Authority in 1992. He was National Portfolio Manager for the Rehabilitation Section before becoming Head of Strategic Supply Development and Innovation in the Authority’s Strategy Directorate.

John was made Head of Research and Innovation for NHS PASA on its formation in April 2000, and was appointed a Director in January 2004, with responsibility for research and innovation and national procurement for food, domestics and textiles categories. After a spell as Director – Policy and Innovation, he recently transferred to the Department of Health’s Procurement, Investment and Commercial Division to take up a new role as Deputy Director, Procurement Policy and Research.