COMPANY BOARD CHANGES

Significant changes have been announced in the structure and personnel of the management team which heads up Somerset-based Candlelight Homecare Services.

The company, which provides homecare services to help and support people so they can continue living in their own home, has appointed former operations director Liz Kirkham as its new managing director following the retirement of David Akerman.

Mr Akerman, from Taunton, who has been with the company for almost five years, becomes company chairman on a part-time basis, succeeding co-founder Cherry Catley-Day who has taken up a new role offering free benefit advice to Candlelight clients.

Mrs Catley-Day, who helped form the company in Glastonbury 21 years ago and which is now one of the largest independent, family-owned homecare providers in the south of England, says the experience and dedication of the team and the new management structure will strengthen the board and take the company forward for the benefit of its clients, both now and in the future.

New managing director Mrs Kirkham, who has been with the company for three years, will be based at the company's Wiltshire office in Trowbridge.

She said she is really looking forward to her new challenge and working with the new board which also now includes marketing manager Linda Stares.

Candlelight’s management accountant Allan Barks has become finance director and also joins the board.

Helen Whyte, previously with Somerset Care, has been appointed operations manager. Mrs Whyte, who lives in Butleigh, is based in the firm’s head office in Glastonbury.

Candlelight Homecare Services operates across Bath & NE Somerset (B&NES), Dorset, East Sussex, Somerset and Wiltshire providing care from 30 minute checks up to 24-hour live-in care.