Key Summary
- The Privy Council at GPhC announced new members, with Anitha Charlesworth joining as lay member immediately.
- Ben Hannan and Professor Christopher Langley will join as pharmacy members, next year April.
- Claire Dearden and Elizabeth (Liz) Fidler, MBA (executive), will also join as pharmacy technician members.
The Privy Council has appointed six new members to the General Pharmaceutical Council’s (GPhC) governing council, beginning in 2026 and 2027.
Anitha Charlesworth will join immediately as a Lay Member, while Sheila Kumar (Lay Member), Christopher Langley (pharmacist member), Liz Fidler (pharmacy technician member), Ben Hannan (pharmacist member) and Claire Dearden (pharmacy technician member) will join from 1 April next year.
All Council members are selected by the Privy Council from a broad range of professional and public backgrounds, ensuring a balanced mix of registrant and lay perspectives.
GPhC chair Gisela Abbam said a diverse Council is essential for well‑informed, public‑interest decisions and welcomed the new members’ expertise in pharmacy, regulation, policy, and healthcare leadership.
“I would also like to thank all those who applied for these important roles, and I look forward to working with our new members to deliver safe, effective and inclusive pharmacy regulation for patients and the public,” she added.
Charlesworth, a health economist, co‑chairs the NHS Productivity Commission for the Health Foundation and is a non‑executive director at West North London ICB, with additional roles in economic and policy advisory bodies.
Kumar, another Lay Member, is an independent non‑executive director at the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and is the senior independent director and chair of the Remuneration and People Committee. She brings experience from the General Dental Council and is also the Chief Executive of the the Council for Licensed Conveyancers.
Professor Langley is an academic pharmacist and Professor of Pharmacy Law and Practice at Aston University, where he leads the Aston Pharmacy School and holds governor and accreditation roles in healthcare and professional regulation. He was previously a member of the Board of Assessors at the GPhC and a registrant member of the Fitness to Practise Committee.
Fidler, a senior advisor in the Chief Pharmaceutical Officer’s Office at NHS England, has led on pharmacy legislation, regulation, and workforce reform and previously served as President of the Association of Pharmacy Technicians UK.
Hannan is Director of Service Transformation, Planning and Performance at NHS Lanarkshire, with senior NHS pharmacy and executive leadership experience. He is the former Chief Pharmacist and Director of Pharmacy and Medicines at NHS Fife and is a Founding Fellow of the Royal College of Pharmacy.
Dearden is a senior pharmacy technician leading medicines optimisation, governance, and service‑improvement programmes at Staffordshire and Stoke‑on‑Trent Integrated Care Board, with extensive strategic and operational pharmacy experience.
