Hospice UK announces new Chief Executive

I feel very honoured to be asked to lead Hospice UK and join its highly respected team and support the hospice and end of life care sector nationally.

Toby Porter, CEO designate of Hospice UK

The hospice sector played a vitally important role during the Covid-19 emergency, and must now shape itself to fit the positive and negative disruption left by the pandemic.

Toby will lead Hospice UK to work with the UK’s incredible network of adult and children’s hospices along with a broad range of health and social care partners to deliver on our vision that everyone should receive the best possible care at the end of their life.

Toby joins from Acorns Children’s Hospice, where he has been Chief Executive since 2016, most recently guiding the West Midlands-based charity and its children’ hospice care service through the unprecedented challenges of the COVID 19 pandemic. He leaves Acorns as one of the most secure and best-loved hospices in the UK, and with a care service and team highly respected across their region. Toby also brings a wealth of senior leadership experience across a wide range of organisations in the charity sector.

Toby said: "Hospices deservedly have a very special place in the hearts of local communities across the UK for the incredible care they provide. But there are still far too many people dying in hospitals or at home who are unable to access hospice standards of care at the end of their lives and whose families do not receive adequate bereavement support.

"This needs to change. We need new approaches to end of life care in the UK, and new conversations about death and dying. I feel very honoured to be asked to lead Hospice UK and join its highly respected team and support the hospice and end of life care sector nationally."

Toby is also a trustee of Together for Short Lives, and knows Hospice UK well as a member of its Advisory Council, on which he has represented children’s hospices since 2018. Toby is also a member of NHS England’s National Children and Young Person’s Palliative and End of Life Care Governance Group.

Hospice UK’s Chair of Trustees Paul Jennings said: “It’s a real thrill for us to welcome Toby as our new Chief Executive.

"We’ve known and worked closely with Toby for several years. His leadership at Acorns has been fantastic, and his vision and passion for hospice and end of life care is impressive. Toby also brings superb, high-level experience from other sectors, which we know we will learn and benefit from.

"Having steered the hospice sector through the pandemic – securing hundreds of millions in government funding support – Hospice UK is now leading critical discussions about the future of end of life care in this country. As health and social care services in all parts of the UK evolve, we have an opportunity to reshape, strengthen and improve end of life care for all. I’m so pleased that Toby will now be driving that work.

"I’d like to thank Craig Duncan for his excellent work as interim CEO since the new year; Craig’s experience and leadership through the most recent round of government funding for hospices has been vital."

Prior to joining Acorns, Toby was Chief Executive at HelpAge International, the secretariat to a global network of civil society organisations working with and for older people. Toby was a member of the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Agenda Council on Population Ageing and was a civil society representative at WEF’s global meetings in Davos from 2014 to 2016.

Toby’s earlier career was largely dedicated to humanitarian aid, when he worked for Save the Children and Oxfam, and led responses to crises including the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004, and the conflicts in Kosovo and Rwanda. Toby is also a College Advisor and Mentor at Green Templeton College, Oxford University.

Toby will continue in his role at Acorns until 9th September before starting at Hospice UK in mid-September. Craig Duncan will continue as interim Chief Executive at Hospice UK until Toby starts.