Oakhaven Hospice has announced the appointment of Melville (Mel) Kendal as the new Chair of its Board of Trustees
Mel will bring extensive experience and expertise to the title having served on the trustee Boards of a number of Charities and was Treasurer of Oakhaven Hospice for eight years before being appointed Chairman. He is a former Leader and Chairman of New Forest District Council and a former Deputy Leader and Chairman of Hampshire County Council.
He has served in various Executive Member functions In Hampshire’s Cabinet over 25 years ,most recently overseeing Hampshire’s capital and revenue expenditure for Economic Development and is credited with initiating the Operation Resilience project to rebuild many of Hampshire’s ailing roads. Before that as Environment lead member he pioneered the 20-is-Plenty campaign to reduce speeds outside schools, and the Choose-30 campaign to limit speeds in participating villages to 30mph. For this, he received the Prince Michael International Road Safety Award on behalf of Hampshire County Council.
Mel led on the county’s Energy strategy to make Hampshire less reliant on carbon energy, replacing streetlights with modern energy saving lamps, promoting electric vehicles, and charging points, having authored a paper for the Association of European Regions on the need for uniformity of vehicle charging points and payment methods.
Mel continues to advise private clients in his consultancy business.
Our outgoing Chairman, Prof. Paul Dodson, had a farewell message to share: "It has been a privilege to be involved with Oakhaven for the last eight years, putting patients and families at the forefront of all the continued development of the services. As a Clinician I have been all too aware of the importance of palliative care services and the truly needed care and support their expertise provides to not only patients and families at the end of life but to the wider community. It requires significant expertise in so many areas to continue these services and I pay tribute to the many many volunteers and dedicated staff. My thanks to the great support from the trustees and my very best wishes to the new chairman Mel Kendal in whose very capable hands Oakhaven will continue to thrive."
