Yahoo News The King's Birthday Honours List for Leicestershire in full
The King's Birthday Honours list has been revealed today and it includes many volunteers, health professionals and local champions from across Leicestershire.
They include a professor who works to improve the survival rates of babies, a disabled campaigner for disability rights, a Coalville fundraiser and a speech therapist working with injured armed forces personnel.
Honours are announced twice a year - once at New Year and once on the monarch's official birthday. King Charles III was born in November 1948 but his official birthday, which is celebrated around the Commonwealth, is June 15.
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These are the local people who are among the dozens being honoured:
Professor Liz Draper MBE
Liz Draper has spent her life dedicated to the health and survival of babies. Professor Draper, who has received an MBE in the Honours List, worked for the University of Leicester for 42 years and since retiring the 66-year-old health expert has continued as an emeritus professor.
She is currently heavily involved in an international project to record better information about stillbirths and regularly works with her PhD students at the university. Elizabeth, who lives in Great Dalby, near Melton, said: "When I found out about the honour I'd just got back from holiday and my husband said, 'You've got a letter from the Cabinet Office!'
"I was gobsmacked and a bit overwhelmed. It wasn't something I'd been expecting at all. I'm delighted."
Penny Broomhead MBE
Another health expert awarded with an MBE is Penny Broomhead, who worked for many years as a physio at Leicester General and continues to dedicate her time to international disabled athletics.
The 69 year old is currently in France as part of her voluntary role, which involves the classification of athletes for the Paralympic Games and other competitions. Commenting on the honur Penny, who lives in Anstey, said: "I was stunned.
"I was just so surprised and really delighted. It was amazing." Penny has been a member of the Medical & Technical Committee of Disability Sport England since 1999 and as well as an International Para Athletics classifier she is an IPC international athletics classification educator.
As well as athletics, she is involved in para cricket and the rugby International Rugby Disability World Cup. She has also been actively involved in other para sports, including triathlon, basketball and equestrian events.
June Murray MBE
About 18 months ago June Murray retired from her role as the principal of Sense College in Loughborough. While the college started out as a school for the blind, it transformed to support youngsters will all kinds of disabilities, including physical disabilities and autism.
The 68 year old, who lives in Shepshed, said: "I was a bit surprised to hear about the honour. You don't feel you deserve it for just doing your job!
"But I'm honoured and flattered people thought it was something I deserved. I was at the college for almost 30 years and it is an amazing place.
"It's a really good example of what young people with special educational needs and disabilities can do given the right opportunities and environment."
Having been appointed principal in 2015, June oversaw not just the college's expansion but also a lot of closer working with employees in the area and mainstream schools to help her students develop independent living skills and prepare for adult life.
Mark Storer BEM
Among those receiving British Empire Medals is Coalville's Mark Storer, 65, who founded and continues to chair the Brown Dog charity supporting cancer care in his area. In 1999 he was given a devastating diagnosis of cancer.
He underwent six months of gruelling chemotherapy and after a year he was given the news that his treatment had been successful. In response he organised a sponsored walking challenge in the Lake District to raise funds to refurbish the day room in the oncology department at Leicester Royal Infirmary.
The fundraising has continued since then, allowing the hospital - and others around the country- to get the best equipment including a £21,000 piece of equipment known as a "liver mircowave" to treat people with liver cancer at the infirmary.
As well as organising all the fundraising challenges, he takes part in each of them, too. He said: "When you get a call from the Cabinet Office telling you you're going to get a British Empire Medal it's a proud moment.
"I was delighted, obviously. I'm still delighted - and also still quite shocked!"
Maureen O’Malley BEM
Another getting a BEM is Maureen O’Malley, 61, who lives in Market Harborough and spent 30 years working for Voluntary Action South Leicestershire before retiring at the end of last year. She started off just answering the phones but rose up the ranks and for the last 12 years was the charity manager.
She said: "I'm very honoured but also very shocked. The work I did was a team job - I had a fantastic group of staff as well as the charity's volunteers, who are the ones who make the organisation.
"It was a very rewarding job."
Voluntary Action South Leicestershire supports carers, isolated people in the south of the county and provides advice. Maureen has also worked had a fortnightly radio slot on Harborough FM and was a member of other organisations in the local area including the Harborough Locality Integrated Leadership Team and Harborough Network Meetings.
Margaret Elizabeth MBE
The former chief medical adviser to the St John Ambulance, Margaret Elizabeth, has received an MBE at the age of 80. Margaret, who lives in Oakham, graduated from the Royal College of Surgeons Dublin in 1969 and was a police forensics officer for 12 years and a member of the Rutland Accident Care Scheme for 20 years, providing emergency medical care at serious road incidents.
She has volunteered for St John Ambulance since 1972, eventually becoming Chief Medical Adviser for England, volunteering at thousands of events over the years providing emergency first aid as a senior doctor covering events including the London Marathon.
She also authored the first First Aid Manual for Sri Lanka in 2018 and for over 40 years has been a volunteer instructor with the Pony Club, and as an examiner for riding and road safety.
During the pandemic she volunteered over 250 hours as an NHS vaccinator.
Nicola Norville MBE
As a member of staff at the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre (DMRC) at Stanford Hall, near Loughborough, Nicola Norville works with the Armed Forces' most severely injured patients. She specialises in speech therapy and alongside her work for her patients, the 51 year old does a lot of charity work raising money to improve facilities at Stanford Hall.
Nicola, who lives in Mountsorrel, has been volunteering as the fundraising manager for the DMRC Benevolent Fund for the past eight years, raising about £200,000 a year. Many of her patients have suffered career-ending injuries and her work helps them live independently and transition into civilian life.
Dr Anna Severwright OBE
Disability rights campaigner Dr Anna Severwright has been made an OBE in the King’s Birthday Honours for her services to disabled and older people. Anna, 38, has used her own experience of disability and living with multiple long-term conditions, as well as her professional training, to build a national platform for change so that disabled and older people’s voices are increasingly influencing national government policy on social care.
Originally qualifying as a doctor, Anna’s health eventually meant she was unable to continue in clinical practice. As someone using Direct Payments to arrange her own adult social care, she has drawn on her experience and insights to drive improvements in the way people access the health and care system for support, to reduce bureaucracy and support changes in practice.
Anna lives in Leicester, and was a former advisor to the House of Lords Adult Social Care Committee and was Commissioner to the Archbishop’s Commission on Re-imagining Care. She is a patient partner with her local NHS Trust and was co-chair of the Coalition for Collaborative Care at NHS England.
She said: “I never expected I to be made an OBE. My imposter syndrome is trying to kick in, but I am pleased to accept it.
"The honour recognises the contribution that people with lived experience make to social care, and also my work with Social Care Future, which is calling for a brighter future for everyone to live in a place we call home, with the people and things we love, in communities where we look out for each other, doing the things that matter to us.
“I know my work stands - or sits! - on the shoulders of many wonderful disabled people who have been fighting for decades and many who still are now. It is positive to see lived experience being valued and I hope there are many more to follow mine.”
David Rowlands Williams MBE
David Rowlands Williams, 71, of Ratby, has been made an MBE for services to education. He was until 2022 the chair of the Discovery Schools Academy Trust.
Since 2016 he has chaired the Trust’s Education Standards Committee and has supported five new schools in joining the trust, including the trust’s first first special schools in Leicester which joined in 2021.
He oversaw the opening of Fossebrook Primary in Leicester Forest East in 2016 which was inspected by Ofsted in 2019 and judged to be good with outstanding features in personal development, behaviour and welfare and early years provision.
Others getting an OBE (Order of the British Empire)
Cricker Katherine Helen Sciver-Brunt, of Hinckley, for services to women's cricket and to the community.
Dr Anna Claire Severwright of Social Care Future and In Control, for services to disabled people in Leicestershire.
Peter Thomas, of Hinckley, who is the former chief executive officer of The Futures Trust in the Midlands.
Lulu Lytle, founder of Soane Britain, which has a workshop in Thurmaston, for services to manufacturing and craftsmanship.
Others receiving the MBE (Members of the Order of the British Empire)
Susan Margaret James. contact centre administration officer for HM Courts and Tribunal Service, for public and voluntary service in Loughborough.
Heather Broughton, who lived in Market Bosworth for over 30 years, for services to heritage for her work on the National Heritage Lottery Fund
Peter Dudley Smith, founder of The Cooke E-Learning Foundation, for services to education and to the community in Beaumont Leys, Leicester.
Others receiving a BEM (Medallists of the Order of the British Empire)
Peter Graham Blount, for services to the community in Wymeswold.
