All of the non-executive directors at embattled health trust Southern Health have resigned.

This afternoon the NHS Foundation Trust announced the remaining four directors - Jon Allen, Malcolm Berryman, Judith Smyth and Trevor Spires - had quit.

Tracey Faraday-Darke stepped down earlier this month, meaning the trust must now recruit five new non-executive directors.

Southern Trust has faced controversy in recent years, including the death of Oxford teenager Connor Sparrowhawk, who drowned in a bath at Slade House in Headington in July 2013.

An official inspection last year prompted by his death concluded 722 people being cared for by Southern Health had died unexpectedly over a four year period.

The trust has since conducted a clinical services review, which assessed its mental health and learning disability services as well as its provision of community physical health services.

In a statement interim chairman Alan Yates said plans it had drawn up for 'much greater inclusion of service users and carers in the organisation' as well as greater integration with primary care and other changes marked 'a turning point in the Trust's life and the opportunity to move forward in a different way from the past.'

He said: "My colleague non-executive directors have offered me their full support in the development of the future strategy of Southern Health over the last few months.

It is clear to us all that the trust leadership will need to look quite different if it is to meet the needs of patients and service users, as well as its stakeholders in the future.

"They have also fully supported me as I try to develop a Board with the skills specific to these new strategic tasks.

"As a consequence, four non-executive directors have this week jointly offered their resignation from their posts so that the governors can, with my help, recruit to the need for all five new non-executive directors.

"I am grateful to my non-executive colleagues for their full support during my tenure as chairman and for their hard work in support of the new strategy and priorities."

The trust will also recruit a new chairman.