Reward society’s ‘true heroes’

SIR, – Rio Olympics has produced 67 medals for Team GB and already the clamour has started to have those medal winners given further awards as part of the Queen’s honours list.

UK Sport allocated around £250million in the four years between London 2012 and Rio 2016 – £250million for 67 medals works out at around £3.7million per medal won.

Is this too high a fiscal cost per medal?

The gold medal winners, especially those who retained their Olympic titles, will no doubt be awarded honours, but should the honours system recognise those who have done nothing other than excel at their chosen occupation? To compete at the top level, you can no longer be an amateur and train outwith normal working hours. But the top level “amateurs" are funded well by UK Sport to produce medals.

Andy Murray is reported to have earned in excess of £5million this season alone. Should the honours system regard him for being the best at his chosen career?

The true heroes who deserve to be recognised are the coaches at clubs who give up their time voluntarily, the volunteers from organisations such as the RVS who give their time to assist the old and infirm, the lonely and needy, the local shopkeeper who keeps an eye out for the older members of society, and perhaps the individual who risks their own life to save another. Let’s get some sense of proportion and reward those true heroes of our society.