New NHS chief has work cut out for him
MSPs insist he faces‘real challenge’at helm inTayside
Under-fire NHS Tayside has appointed a former hospital porter as its new chief executive.
Grant Archibald ,the current chief operating officer of acute services with NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, will replace Malcolm Wright as chief executive in the new year.
Mr Archibald will be the third chief executive at the health board in just a year.
Lesley McLay stepped down in April after it emerged charity money had been used to pay for IT equipment.
However, Mr Archibald said that he was excited to be taking on the new role: “I know that the staff in Tayside do amazing things every day, both in communities and in our hospitals, and it is now my job to make sure that they can keep making a difference to patients, service users and their families.
“Health and social care services are changing across the country and I look forward to the opportunity of working with my staff and partner organisations to deliver quality services for the population.
“I want Tayside to be at the forefront of designing better, more joined-up pathways of care from home to hospital and back home again, so that everyone can benefit from improved outcomes and better health and wellbeing.”
Roseanna Cunningham, Perthshire South and Kinrossshire MSP, said Mr Archibald faced “real challenges” but added: “There is no doubt that Mr Archibald seems well suited for the position.
“He comes from a senior position at Greater Glasgow and Clyde where he had responsibility for some major projects, such as the new Queen Elizabeth University Hospital.
“Not only that, but it can be fairly said that he knows the health service – and NHS Tayside in particular – from every level, having worked at Ninewells as a porter and a graduate trainee before gaining senior management experience at three of Scotland’s largest health boards.”
However, local Tory politicians have warned he will have his work cut out to solve the health board’s problems.
Liz Smith MSP said: “I would like to welcome Mr Archibald to NHS Tayside and thank Malcolm Wright for his work during his interim period as chief executive.
“However, Mr Archibald will inherit a health board undergoing significant change and I hope that he is able to get up to speed quickly.
“Decisions over primary care, staffing levels and out-of-control waiting time lists need urgent attention and he will have to work hard to convince patients that the problems at NHS Tayside are a thing of the past.” Archibald is the new chief executive of NHS Tayside