SALISBURY District Hospital welcomed a special guest to meet with staff and discuss diversity, equality and inclusion.

Lord Victor Adebowale, the chief executive of Turning Point, visited Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust to meet the hospital’s chief executive, Cara Charles-Barks, the Trust’s chairman, Nick Marsden, and staff.

His visit included seeing critical care services and meeting diversity, equality and inclusion champions in the hospital. There was also a “town hall” style meeting with staff.

Lord Adebowale said: “I was interested by the hospital’s approach. Cara and I had a robust conversation about transforming services and the NHS’ culture, with the aim of ensuring that health inequalities become a thing of the past not a reality of the future. There were highly intelligent questions at the staff ‘town hall’ meeting but it was the passion for patient care, the enthusiasm and dedication of the staff that shone through.”

He said: “[The visit] was about me coming down both as a cross bench peer with a huge interest in health and how it is applied on the ground, but also as chief executive of Turning Point to come and see our acute partners.”

Turning Point is a social enterprise providing services to people covering areas such as substance misuse, mental health and learning disabilities.

Speaking about his visit, he said: “It has been great, it has been really impressive in a number of areas.”

He said: “I spent time talking to staff about the work being done on diversity and equality and how that is being led by the chief executive and the chair who see it as key to the sustainability of the hospital and the delivery of strong patient care. All in all it was a really strong visit and I am deeply impressed by the leadership of the hospital. I’m looking forward to Turning Point building a strong partnership with them.”

The hospital’s chief executive Cara Charles-Bark said: “It has been fantastic to welcome such a senior and influential person to Salisbury hospital; it is a vote of confidence in the trust and in our role as a leader in our local community. I hope that this visit will be the start of a long term relationship with Turning Point.”