Gordon Tollefson, JP DL

After a lifetime of work in the NHS, Gordon took early retirement in January 2006 from his full time position as a Divisional Director for A&E Services with West Yorkshire Metropolitan Ambulance Service NHS Trust. Believing himself to be too young to retire completely he immediately joined a GP Consortium in Leeds as a part-time executive Director before moving into Leeds South & East Clinical Commissioning Group as a non-executive Director until 2017.

Appointed as a Magistrate in 1994, Gordon served on a number of Committees within the Courts including the Lord Chancellor’s Advisory Committee which deals with the recruitment and disciplinary issues concerning Magistrates. He served as Chair of the Leeds Youth Panel from 2010 to 2013 before being elected as Chair of the Bench for Leeds Magistrates’ Courts in 2014 until it became a part of the new West Yorkshire Bench in 2017.

He is involved in many charities in West Yorkshire and to mention just three of them –

• He was instrumental in launching an appeal for a Hospice to serve the former Yorkshire Coalfields. Since 2001 he has served as the Chair of the Trustees of the Prince of Wales Hospice in Pontefract.
• A member of St John Ambulance since 1977, he is a Commander of the Sovereign Order of St John for England and the Islands and serves as the Chair of the South & West Yorkshire County Priory Group of the Order.
• Since retiring from the ambulance service he has served as coordinator and registered manager of the West Yorkshire Medic Response Team – a small charity which trains Doctors in pre-hospital trauma care both in the classroom situation and also in responding to serious life threatening incidents under the auspices of an experienced senior Doctor and supported by a Paramedic.

Married to Sally and with two sons, who have both made careers in the financial sector. Gordon was appointed as a Deputy Lieutenant in 2008.

Year Appointed: 2008

Male Deputy Lieutenant Badge