Firstly, a huge thank you to all our colleagues and partners for all your efforts as you have been working through the heatwave! I know it has been really tough to work in the recent hot weather. I am hoping that the weather will be cooling down over the coming days, at least for the foreseeable future. I really appreciate your efforts in ensuring that our most vulnerable patients have been well supported over the last few days.

Firstly, I would like to thank everyone who has been involved in our CQC Well-Led Inspection this week. I had the privilege, with Wellington Makala, our Chief Nurse and Executive Director for AHPs and Psychological Professions, of presenting to the CQC inspection team.

This month is LGBT Pride Month and I am delighted to see all of the activity being led by our LGBT+ Staff Network. Colleagues attended Canterbury Pride for the first time at the weekend and it looked like a brilliant day.

This week I’ll start by saying a huge thank you to all colleagues who worked over the long Bank Holiday weekend to ensure that our patients and their loved ones were well cared for, I really do appreciate it. I hope that if you did work you will plan to have some time off soon.

I am going to start this week by sharing some feedback from our Trust Board meeting that took place on Tuesday. We always begin each meeting with a patient journey as it really helps to ground us and it is so important for us to remember why we are all here.