I am pleased to announce that we have won the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service after being nominated a year ago by Deputy Lord Lieutenant of the County of Worcestershire, Dr. Umesh Udeshi.
This is an amazing accolade for the work that this group has done for men and their family/friends over the past 17 years since the group was officially formed in 2000.
Chairman Paul Brothwell and myself, filled out the paperwork for this award last year and submitted it. This was followed up by an in-depth interview that Paul and I had to undergo explaining the work of the group.
We were informed that we had got the award for the group a few weeks ago but had to keep quiet about this until it had been formally announced by the Palace on Friday 2nd June. We attended the Queen’s Garden Party on Tuesday 23rd May with 8,000 other people from all parts of the world and communities. It was an amazing experience and very well organised and both Paul and myself spoke and shook hands with Camilla the Duchess of Cornwall, while Prince Charles, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh also greeted a multitude of people. Luckily the weather was kind, not too hot and no heavy rain, and we met our spouses by the Serpentine for some supper before returning later that evening on the Chiltern railway.
This award is recognition of all the work we have done over the past 17 years working with men and their families/friends when diagnosed with prostate cancer and I would like to pay tribute to all the people involved in the past and present time in achieving this.
When I started the group in 2000 I had already organised several coffee mornings to get a number of men together and chatting, then finally we had a meeting where we signed people up as members. The initial committee who helped me to achieve this were:-
Colin Tomkinson, John Poole, Paul Brothwell, Lyn Bladen and Malcolm Pritchard. We were soon joined by John Banner, Barbara Pugh and Derek Harrington. Over the years we have also had other committee members who have helped with the setting up of the Widow’s group, Newsletters and Buddies including:- Frank Carter, Doreen Phillips, Michael Massey, Roger Ireson, Jean Smith, Tony Jones, Richard MurrayPeters and Gill McIntyre.
We have also had support and help from our ladies in the Widows group, wives or husbands of committee members, Facilitators and Buddies for our various events.
