Alun is Chief Executive of Hafal, Wales’ leading charity for people with serious mental illness and their carers. Hafal is a membership-led organisation which supports over 1,300 people across Wales every day.
Alun is a Registered Nurse and has worked in the NHS, developed a neurological rehabilitation service in the private healthcare sector, and now with Hafal is working on the development of a user-led in-patient facility run by the charity. He has personal experience as a carer of a family member with enduring mental illness.
Alun recently achieved a first class LLB (Hons) degree with the Open University and previously completed an MA in the Ethics of Social Welfare at Keele focussing on the importance of promoting autonomy and avoiding paternalistic relationships with people who have a serious mental illness in order that they can learn to make sustainable life choices when developing their recovery. This work and the ongoing empowerment ethos of the organisation has given Alun a passion for the development of further rights for people recovering from serious mental illness. His current PhD studies in law at Swansea University are exploring how Welsh specific legislation might provide additional rights to patients by taking a more fundamental view of parity.
Alun previously gave evidence to both the both Welsh Affairs Select Committee in Westminster and the Welsh Government on the development of the Mental Health (Wales) Measure and was heavily involved both at Westminster and in Cardiff in the campaign against the draft Mental Health Bill 2002.
