Officers and Executives
The leadership team at the RCGP includes the President, Chair, the CEO and directors across the UK.
Officers
Professor Kamila Hawthorne MBE, Chair of RCGP Council
Kamila has been a GP for 34 years, with 27 of them spent working in South Wales. She qualified from Somerville College, Oxford, in 1984, and completed her GP training in Nottingham in 1988. Kamila was Head of the Graduate Entry Medicine Programme at Swansea University and is on the Trustee Boards of the Kings Fund, and Cardiff Women’s Aid. She is also a Bevan Commissioner and a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales.
Kamila has a deep interest in medical education, and believes that we should be training excellent, caring and inclusive clinicians, for a global society. She is passionate about the role of GPs in patient care and as advocates for patients.
Her research and clinical working interests have been in health inequalities and access to health services, (her MD was based on working with BAME patient groups with Type 2 diabetes in Nottingham, Manchester and Cardiff). With wide experience of general practice and running community projects in diabetes and heart disease, she has been named ‘GP of the Year’ twice and was awarded an MBE in 2017 for services to General Practice.
Dr Victoria Tzortziou Brown OBE, Vice Chair - External Affairs
Dr Victoria Tzortziou Brown is the RCGP`s Vice Chair for External Affairs, with core responsibilities on health policy, systems working and integration. She has been an East London GP for over 20 years, and has worked across health and social care, academia and with communities. She has worked towards identifying innovative solutions for improving health and care services and narrowing health inequalities.
She combines research and extensive clinical commissioning experience. She is currently the Research and Innovation lead of North East London Integrated Care System, which serves around two million people. She collaborates with NHS, public health, academic and VCSE partners towards increasing engagement in research and innovation.
Victoria has served as the College's Honorary Secretary and RCGP London Faculties Chair, and more recently has co-chaired the RCGP`s Health Inequalities Standing Group. She is a Founding Senior Fellow of the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management and a non-executive director at Turning Point, with an OBE for her services in general practice. In her academic role at the Wolfson Institute of Population Health, Queen Mary University of London, Victoria undertakes health policy and systems research. She has a particular focus on the design and evaluation of healthcare interventions and impact on professional behaviour and health inequalities. She also supervises GP Academic Clinical Fellows and early career researchers in Global Health.
Professor Margaret Ikpoh, Vice Chair - Professional Standards, Training and Development
Margaret Ikpoh is a GP Partner at Holderness Health, a practice for 36,000 patients in East Yorkshire and has worked there for 12 years.
She is the practice lead for research and has had previous roles with the NIHR Yorkshire and Humber as a research champion for First5 GPs and AITs.
She is also an Associate Director for Primary Care for Hull York Medical School and is a GP Trainer.
Currently she co-chairs the regional Primary Care Workforce Group with NHS England & Improvement for the North-East and Yorkshire Regional People Board.
At the RCGP, she has been involved in the Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Task groups and was awarded Fellow of The Year at the 2021 RCGP Inspire Awards ceremony.
Dr Thomas Patel-Campbell, Vice Chair - Finance and Member Value
Thomas completed his GP training in 2016, moving to York where he works as a GP partner. He qualified from UCL in 2011 with an MBBS in Medicine and a B.Sc. in Infection.
In addition to his clinical sessions, he is his partnership's Director of Clinical Operations. He has clinical interests in respiratory medicine and contraceptives/sexual health. His other interests include the development of at-scale practices and multi-disciplinary teams, and digital transformation.
He was elected as a Member Trustee of RCGP Trustee Board in 2023. He previously held roles as the honorary treasurer and then chair of the Humber and the Ridings faculty. He was awarded First 5 of the year at the 2019 RCGP Inspire Awards, and RCGP fellowship in 2024.
Dr Michael Mulholland, Honorary Secretary
Michael is a GP partner and GP trainer at Unity Health Buckinghamshire where he has worked for over 20 years. He has had a portfolio career with an educational focus having been programme director and Associate GP dean for Buckinghamshire as part of Oxford Deanery / HEE Thames Valley.
He has particular interests in the developing Quality Improvement Methodology in primary care and the development of the Multidisciplinary workforce.
This work has continued in roles with RCGP at Faculty Regional level and most recently nationally as Vice Chair Professional Development and Standards.
Dr Richard Vautrey, President
Dr Vautrey has been a GP partner in a training practice in Leeds for nearly 30 years and has worked as a GP in urban and rural settings in Nigeria. His previous leadership roles include BMA GP committee chair in England and GPC UK, and he has been a member of the GPC negotiating and executive team from 2004.
A graduate of Manchester University, he completed his GP training in Rochdale and Manchester, obtaining MRCGP in 1994. He has been a member of the College ever since. He has many years of experience as a member of RCGP Council, being a GPC observer between 2005-10, a nationally elected member from 2010-17 and again since 2022. He attends Yorkshire Faculty meetings.
Executives
Chris Askew OBE, Chief Executive Officer
Chris Askew joined the College as Chief Executive Officer in October 2023, after eight years as CEO at Diabetes UK.
He was previously Chief Executive at Breakthrough Breast Cancer where he led the charity eventually into a merger to form the new charity Breast Cancer Now.
After working as a shipbroker in the international freight markets, he moved into the charitable sector in 1997. He has subsequently held senior fundraising positions at the charities Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Crisis, and Action for Children.
He is a Trustee of the National Academy for Social Prescribing and the charity Action for A-T.
He was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s 2020 Birthday Honours List for services to people with diabetes.
Ben Clacy, Executive Director of Membership Development and Education
Ben has joined the College from NHS Providers, where he was Director of Development and Operations, looking after membership, finance, IT, HR, member programmes, commercial partnerships and events. NHS Providers is the membership organisation and trade association for the NHS acute, ambulance, community and mental health services that treat patients and service users in the NHS.
Previous to that, Ben was Chief Executive of itSMF UK, a not for profit focused on best practice in the IT Service Management industry. As part of this role, he also sat on the board of the Skills Framework for Information Age (SFIA) acting as their Treasurer and on the board of itSMF International as their Company Secretary.
His background prior to this was in a variety of roles within the commercial sector including business development, operations, programme management and procurement.
With over 12 years of experience in the not-for-profit sector, Ben is also a Trustee and Company Secretary of a charity, MS Research treatment and education. This national charity is dedicated to furthering understanding of MS and in then helping to develop better treatments.
Fiona Erasmus, Executive Director of Professional Development and Standards
Fiona was appointed as the Executive Director of Professional Development and Standards in August 2016, bringing over 16 years of experience within medical/dental education.
She first joined the College in 2005 to set up the certification department (after the closure of the Joint Committee on Postgraduate Training for General Practice, where she had been the Head of Certification). In 2007, she became Head of Postgraduate Training and held this post until 2013. She was then appointed Director of the Faculty of General Dental Practice (UK) England, the professional membership body for general dental practitioners, at the Royal College of Surgeons.
Fiona is responsible for College work relating to postgraduate training, assessment and quality.
Mark Thomas, Executive Director of Policy and Engagement
Mark joined the College as Head of Policy six years ago and was appointed as Executive Director of Policy and Engagement in December 2017. His portfolio of responsibilities includes Devolved Councils, policy, public affairs and corporate communications.
His background in public policy and campaigning includes roles at Unison, Shelter and the Confederation of British Industry (CBI).
During his time at the College, he has transformed our influencing work with government, opinion formers and other external stakeholders. He played a lead role in the Put patients first: Back general practice campaign and the subsequent announcement of the GP Forward View in England.
He is currently overseeing the College's campaigning efforts to deliver equivalent promises of funding in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
RCGP Devolved Council Chairs
Dr Chris Provan, Chair of RCGP Scotland
Dr Chris Provan is the Chair of the Royal College of Practitioners in Scotland and a GP partner at the Elmbank Medical Practice in Aberdeen.
He cares for patients from deprived communities with multiple medical issues and is the substance misuse lead within the practice. He has been involved with training medical students, foundation doctors and GP specialty trainees.
His practice’s completion of the RCGP Quality Practice Award when he was a trainee inspired him to join his local North East Scotland Faculty Board, and he has been a member of Scottish Council since 2018. He has also served as Aberdeen City HSCP lead.
Chris enjoys working with his patients, some of whom he has known for 30 years, and wants to promote the value GPs bring to their communities.
Dr Rowena Christmas, Chair of RCGP Wales
Dr Rowena Christmas is a GP Principal at Wye Valley Practice in Monmouthshire where she has worked for 22 years.
Rowena is a passionate advocate of the importance of Primary Care to the NHS and the value of continuity of care for both patients & doctors. She serves on the RCGP Committee of Medical Ethics and has been RCGP Lead for Safeguarding in Wales.
Outside the College, Rowena is Vice Chair of the Welsh Medical Committee, leading on Safeguarding & Advance Care Planning and a Bevan Exemplar for the establishment of Safeguarding Supervision Groups across Wales. She has been an active advocate for general practice in the media.
Dr Ursula Mason, Chair of Northern Ireland Council
Dr Ursula Mason took up the role of RCGPNI Chair in November 2022. She is a GP partner in Carryduff Surgery. She is a former Chair of South Belfast GP Federation and Associate Director of GP training at NIMDTA.
Ursula is passionate about training the future generation of doctors and acts as a GP trainer and undergraduate GP tutor.
Her Chair’s priority during her tenure with RCGPNI will be building a GP workforce that is fit for the future.
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