A Welcome from the Champion of the Health and Social Care Network!

Welcome to the Health and Social Care Network of the Third Sector Assembly. My name is Cath Gilliver and I am the Champion for the Health and Social Care Network.

The network was formed to:

• Adopt an approach to policy development within Health and Social Care that locates the Third Sector proactively as an agenda setter
• Create space for third sector organisations and networks operating within Health and Social Care to progress their priorities. We organise formal meetings, informal discussion groups, group emails and online discussion forums
• Make use of a full range of inclusive and interactive communications channels. We produce a regular Health and Social Care e-bulletin
• Build upon third sector activity and established good practice within Health and Social Care. We produce policy briefings and offer reference to research publications

A little bit about me...

I trained as a psychiatric nurse and then as a psychotherapist and worked within Birmingham NHS Mental Health Services for 30 years, for the last 5 years as a Senior Manager. I then became a Senior Mental Health Commissioner for a Primary Care Trust but felt that the culture lacked flexibility.

As a result I joined the voluntary sector in 2005 as Regional Director for icap, (Immigrant Counselling and Psychotherapy), and became Chief Executive of SIFA and then SIFA Fireside in 2007. My current role has given me plenty of scope for creative development, as well as a number of challenges in relation to funding and the need to grow our infrastructure in tandem with new services.

I feel strongly that the voluntary sector has a huge contribution to make within the Health and Social Care field and look forward to representing the sector's interests at a strategic level.