Michael McDonagh
Michael joined PA Housing in 2023 as our Chief Executive. Michael spent most of his career with KPMG where he was the UK Chief Operating Officer and led a successful public sector business. He has worked extensively across the social housing sector. He is a supporter of social housing and brings this, along with a strong commercial focus, to PA. Michael has worked with many of the UK’s largest and most innovative social housing providers over his 25 years of working in the housing sector. He is also an experienced Non-Executive Director and this will be valuable to help us ensure that we have an effective Board and Leadership Team.
Suzannah Taylor
Suzannah joined PA Housing in 2018. She is our Executive Director for Development and is responsible for the delivery of new affordable homes, regeneration schemes, our relationships with our grant funding partners at the GLA and Homes England Strategic Partnership, and our shared ownership sales and commercial portfolios. She also leads on promoting sustainability in the development of new homes. Before joining PA Housing Suzannah worked in the Local Authority sector where she gained experience in housing policy, homelessness and temporary accommodation before progressing her career in development. She is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute of Housing and a Board Member at OEHA – a small housing association with a focus on providing low-cost accommodation for people working in education.
Charles Ellis
Charles joined the former Paragon Community Housing in 1996. He is our Executive Director of Asset Management and is responsible for the delivery of our property investment works which includes kitchen and bathroom replacements, window replacements, new roofs and cyclical decoration programmes. He is also responsible for the gas servicing and breakdown service, testing and maintenance of our building equipment such as fire alarms and lifts, plus fire safety improvement works, electrical testing, asbestos and water safety. He has 25 years’ experience working in social housing and asset management.
Ben Thomas
Ben joined PA in 2024 as Executive Director, Core Services and Transformation. He brings extensive and varied experience from the corporate sector having most recently worked for BT holding senior leadership roles across transformation, general/commercial management and strategy. Earlier in his career Ben worked as lawyer. Outside of work Ben is an elected district councillor and a trustee for Citizen Advice.
Simon Hatchman
Simon joined the former asra Housing in 2016. He is our Executive Director of Resources and is responsible for finance, treasury, IT and HR. Simon has worked in the social housing sector since 1995, including senior roles with various housing associations, as a regulator, and working for a body which provides loan finance to housing associations. He is CIMA (Chartered Institute of Management Accountants) qualified. He is a Board member at Trident Group, another housing association based in Birmingham, and a Trustee at Linkage Community Trust.
Maria Moriaty
Director of Resident Engagement
Maria joined PA Housing in 2024 as Director of Resident Engagement and Community.
She has nearly 20 years’ experience working in social housing and has managed a broad range of service areas such as housing services, business support, income, facilities as well as resident engagement.
Maria is passionate about ensuring residents have a voice and opportunities to shape the services provided to them by their housing association.
Sally-Anne Underhill
Director of Neighbourhoods and Customer Contact
Sally-Anne joined former Leicester Housing Association in Sept 2007
She is our Director of Neighbourhoods and Customer Contact and is responsible for all our Neighbourhood Co Ordinator’s, Repairs and Housing HUBs.
Sally started working in housing within the Armed Forces then moved into Social Housing in the mid 90’s, working in direct homeless hostels and has worked in various fields within housing from specialist housing, allocations, lettings, call centres, estates, and housing management. Sally joined us as a low-level manager and has successfully progressed her career within the organisation, she is keen innovator and always looking for new ways of working and engaging with our residents.
Emma Conlon
Director of Income and Home Moves
Emma Joined the former Leicester Housing Association in October 1999.
She is the Director of Income and Home Moves and is responsible for income recovery, tenancy sustainment support and home moves activities across PA.
Emma has committed her career to social housing and has held various roles across the sector.
Emma is a Chartered Fellow in Management (CMI) and has a Degree in Housing, Communities and Regeneration.
Stephen Gathercole
Director of Property Services (Midlands)
Stephen is our Director of Property Services for the Midlands. He is responsible for all responsive repairs within our Midlands properties, as well as gas and renewable heating services across our whole portfolio.
He joined PA Housing in August 2023 as Head of Repairs for the Midlands, after working with British Gas for 32 years. Stephen started his career as an apprentice heating engineer and spent more than ten years carrying out repairs in people’s homes before moving into his first managerial role. Across the next 20 years he fulfilled a number of roles including Operations Manager, Regional Manager and Head of Product, all of which had customer service excellence at their heart. Stephen brings a wealth of experience in building operational teams that focus on the customer’s needs and is committed to driving continuous improvement in the repairs service our residents receive.
Stephen has demonstrated his commitment to our business and ultimately our residents by choosing to join us after such long tenure with his previous employer, and his knowledge and experience in delivering great levels of customer service will benefit all our residents going forward.
Donna Brace
Director of Asset Management
Donna joined PA Housing in 2003.
Donna is our Director of Asset Management and is responsible for the delivery of major works and improvement programmes including kitchen and bathroom replacements, window and door replacements, new roofs, heating upgrades and communal and external decoration programmes. She also leads on PA’s decarbonisation strategy for the delivery of retrofit works.
‘Growing up on a council estate I was too embarrassed to have friends visit because it wasn’t very well maintained, and the stigma attached to living in social housing. I feel very passionate that everyone should have a home that makes them feel safe, secure and one they can be proud of. My role gives me the opportunity to work with my team and others to achieve this.’
Donna has over 20 years’ experience working in social housing and asset management and is a qualified Surveyor.
Robert Greene
Director of Building and Construction
Robert joined PA Housing in 2018.
He is our Director of Building and Construction and is responsible for delivering our new homes programme with over 2000 homes under construction throughout London, Surrey and the Midlands. Robert is responsible for maintaining our design and technical standards, specification and manages our aftercare and quality assurance team.
Robert has over 30 years’ construction management experience and has worked in the social housing sector since 2002. He is focused on working collaboratively to deliver quality new homes for our valued customers. Before joining PA Housing, Robert held head of service roles at One Housing Group, A2Dominion Group and Catalyst Housing Group, where he has led teams and delivered homes for rent, shared ownership and market sale. Prior to that Robert worked in general construction, commercial office and retail fit-out contracts on both the client and contractor side.
He has a Diploma in Civil Engineering and BSc(Hons) degree in Building and attained Fellowship status with the Chartered Institute of Building (FCIOB). Robert is also a Chartered Surveyor and member of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (MRICS). In addition to his extensive development experience, Robert enjoyed 9-years as a Non-executive Director of Westway Housing Association, based in North Kensington and was Chair of the Board until October 2021.
Pete Beggan
Director of Sales and Commercial Services
Pete Joined PA Housing in 2018
He is our Director of Sales and Commercial Services and is responsible for sales of all shared ownership homes, stock disposal/transfers, regeneration, new business and the GLA & Homes England programme.
Pete has been working in the sector since 2005 and thoroughly enjoys it. He is looking for opportunities to deliver new homes for rent and shared ownership, through land led and package deals across London, Surrey & the Midlands.
Emma Macnish
Director of People
Emma joined the former Leicester Housing Association in February 2003.
She is the Director of People and is responsible for HR and Learning & Development and leads the strategic development across the range of HR areas.
Emma has worked in social housing since 2003 and has held various roles within HR and prior to this worked in HR at BT and Samworth Brothers.
Emma is CIPD qualified.
Jacqui Gregory
Director of Governance
Jacqui initially joined PA Housing in May 2022 as a Governance Consultant and was appointed Company Secretary and Director of Governance in late 2022.
She worked previously at the Office of Communications (Ofcom) as its Corporation Secretary. Jacqui has wide company secretarial and corporate governance experience in other regulated global insurance and financial organisations in private and listed organisations and large public sector bodies.
She brings broad technical expertise in corporate governance, statutory compliance and regulatory compliance, with extensive experience in creating and implementing corporate governance frameworks and schemes of delegation. Jacqui is a fellow member of the Chartered Governance Institute.
Richard Carter
Director of Finance
Richard joined PA Housing in April 2018.
He is our Director of Finance and is responsible for the financial services and reporting teams, to ensure we meet our financial objectives and deliver value for money to our residents.
He has over 15 years’ experience in senior housing finance roles in organisations across the North and South of the UK, and has previously led finance teams in the retail and manufacturing sectors including five years as a pension scheme trustee.
He is a Fellow Member of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (FCCA) having qualified whilst working at a leading UK accountancy firm.
Ian Kerr
Director of Treasury and Financial Planning
Ian started working for PA Housing in 2017.
He is our Director of Treasury and Financial Planning and is responsible for our treasury operations, business planning and development finance activity.
Prior to joining PA Housing Ian worked in the private sector in an array of corporate treasury roles across several large companies.
He is AMCT (Association of Corporate Treasurers) qualified, with additional qualifications in Economics and in Business Analysis.
Gurprit Sahota
Director of Technology
Gurprit Sahota is a technology professional with 29 years of experience in the field of information technology. Throughout his career, Gurprit has demonstrated a deep understanding of technology and its impact on business operations.
Gurprit began his career as a Technical Infrastructure Engineer and quickly rose through the ranks to become a technology leader. Over the years, he has gained expertise in a wide range of technologies, including digital, cloud computing, cybersecurity, and service delivery. He has a strong track record of leveraging technology to improve efficiency, increase productivity, and reduce costs.
In his current role as Director of Technology, he oversees the organisation’s technology strategy, ensuring that it aligns with the company's business goals.
