Directors

Alison Thain

Group Chief Executive

Alison has worked in the Tees Valley for over 13 years, beginning as Chief Executive of Cleveland & Teesside Housing Society. In April 2008 Alison became the Group Chief Executive of Fabrick Housing Group, a strategic partnership of TVHG, of which Alison was Chief Executive, and Erimus Housing.

Alison’s other activities include membership of the Board of Regional Development Agency One North East where she is Chair of its Regeneration Committee, as well as being the Agency’s Design Champion. She is a Governor of the University of Teesside and was awarded the OBE in The Queen’s Birthday Honours in June 2004.

Martin Hawthorne

Group Director of Development and Regeneration

Martin joined TVHG’s Development team in 2001 and can now call on 20 years experience in housing. Starting in Hull in housing Administration and management, Martin has experience through finance and development working throughout the North of England. His current role in Fabrick is to oversee the development process for building new homes and partnerships within the family of Fabrick - acting as a service provider for the subsidiaries Erimus and Tees Valley.

Susie Thompson

Group Director of Operations

Susie started her housing career working for Scottish Special Housing Association in Glasgow over 20 years ago. She worked in a number of key housing management positions including Director of Housing at Erimus Housing and now Group Director of Operations for the Fabrick Housing Group. Susie has overall responsibility for all of the housing management services across the group, including estate management, resident involvement, tenancy forcement, allocations, lettings, homelessness, customers access and overall customer satisfaction for services being provided to tenants and leaseholders.

Heather Ashton

Group Director of Finance and Corporate Services

Heather started her housing career in 2005 at Wakefield and District Housing where she initially held the role of Assistant Director Finance followed by Service Director People. Heather moved out of the sector briefly in 2008 to take up the role of Director of Finance for Teesside University and from 2010 was also a board member at Vela. In her role at Fabrick, Heather has overall responsibility for finance and corporate services including people and organisational development, governance and ICT.

Heather is also a governor at Freebrough Academy in Brotton and a governor at Prior Pursglove Sixth Form College, Guisborough.

Chris Smith

Managing Director of Erimus Housing

Chris joined Erimus Housing in November 2004 as Director of Regeneration. She has worked in housing for more than 20 years and spent the majority of her career at Sunderland City Council where she held a variety of posts in development, policy and strategy. She joined Sunderland Housing Group as Head of Regeneration in September 2001.

Chris is responsible for managing the business of Erimus Housing and working with the Board to ensure the vision for Erimus Housing is delivered. Chris is also part of the Fabrick Housing Group senior management team.

Doug Ross

Managing Director of Tees Valley Housing

Doug joined Tees Valley Housing, then named Tees Valley Housing Group, in 2001 as Group Director of Finance & Corporate Services. He has worked in both the public and private sectors, particularly in the field of urban regeneration. In addition to his financial role he acted as Company Secretary in Tees Valley Housing Group.

On formation of the Fabrick Housing Group, Doug was appointed as the Managing Director of Tees Valley Housing Ltd and a director of each of its subsidiary companies, Partnering Plus Ltd and TVH Ltd; the former being a housing-led regeneration company and the latter a developer of housing for outright sale.