National Health and Care Strategic Information Governance Network 2021 Award Winners Announced

 

On the evening of Wednesday 24 November at a glitzy Awards Ceremony hosted online, the National Health and Care Strategic Information Governance Network (National SIGN) announced the winners of its 2021 Awards. They are:

 

- Information Governance Professional of the Year: Barry Moult, Information Governance Consultant and Founder, BJM IG Privacy Ltd

- Information Sharing Champion of the Year: Victoria Blyth, Privacy & Data Protection Lead / Deputy Data Protection Officer, London Borough of Barnet

- Information Governance Team of the Year: Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust

- Information Governance Human Encyclopaedia: Alex Rudkin, Head of Quality and Improvement, St Raphael’s Hospice

- Outstanding Contribution to Information Governance: Peter Wilson, Data Protection Officer and Information Governance, Caldicott & SIRO Support Manager (Retired), Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

 

And, due to the pandemic, the National SIGN took the opportunity to recognise the invaluable contribution the profession has made to managing the Coronavirus situation by adding a one-off additional Award:

 

- Special Recognition for Supporting the Covid-19 Effort with Information Governance: NHS Blood & Transplant

 

The National SIGN was pleased to warmly welcome two very special contributions to the Awards Ceremony. Dr Nicola Byrne, the National Data Guardian for Health and Care opened the evening with a keynote address covering the NDG, her priorities and the impact of Covid-19 in the health and care sector. She was followed at the end of the evening with a pre-recorded message from the outgoing Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham, who took the opportunity to acknowledge and thank Barry Moult for his contribution to Data Protection in the healthcare, and congratulate him personally for winning the 2020 Information Commissioner’s Officer (ICO) Data Protection Practitioner’s Award. This is an Award that is typically presented at the ICO’s Annual Conference, which was unfortunately cancelled in 2020 due to the pandemic.

 

Andrew Harvey, Chair of the National SIGN (and Head of Information Governance / Data Protection Officer at University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust), who hosted the event, said that “at a time in the world when there is so much challenge, our sector has never felt that so much”. He continued, “I am aware of colleagues working extremely long hours, supporting extremely complex and complicated projects through Data Protection and related legislative hurdles, and how challenging the work and processes can be. These awards are in place to celebrate the amazing input my colleagues up and down the country do, so very often unseen, and often against great adversity. These challenges are why we added our Covid award this year, and I massively congratulate the winner of that Award, and the winners and nominees of all Awards for their ongoing diligence and tenacity, they are all shining lights in our industry”.

 

The Awards were judged by a panel of Information Governance experts from around the country, with all nomination statements being blinded so far as was practicable by name, gender, organisations, ethnicity and location.