HONOURS LIST
WHO GOT WHAT
LILIAN HOCHHAUSER, who has been appointed CBE for services to arts and cultural relations in the New Year’s Honours, is considered, at 90, the grande dame of Anglo-Jewish arts.
She said she was “delighted. It means what I’ve done in my career has been of some importance.
“I think it recognises all my work, in the arts and in cultural relations. That has been most satisfying — using the arts to communicate.”
With her husband Victor, the couple are the leading impresarios who brought Russian musicians and dance companies to Britain, among many other performers over the last 60 years.
David Meller was appointed CBE for services to education. He is the founder of the Meller Educational Trust and chair of the National Apprenticeship Ambassadors Network.
He said: “I’m thrilled. I have worked for 30 years in education and I’m passionate about helping less privileged children.” Mr Meller, whose business the Meller Group, is one of the largest luxury home and beauty suppliers in the UK, is a non-executive board member of the Department for Education.
Lynne Franks, who made her name as a celebrity PR guru, was appointed OBE for her work in fashion, business and women’s empowerment.
She founded one of the UK’s bestknown public relations consultancies in the 1970s and is currently an advo- cate, communications strategist, writer and spokeswoman on women’s issues.
“I’m very excited to have received the honour,” she said. “Absolutely delighted. For me, the most important thing is being recognised for women’s empowerment. I don’t know if that’s been honoured before.”
Professor Judy Sebba, director of the University of Oxford’s Rees Centre for Research in Fostering and Education, was appointed OBE for her services to higher education and disadvantaged young people. She said she was delighted, and stressed the invaluable contributions made by her colleagues.
Her current research is on improving the educational outcomes of children in care.
Naomi Marek services to special educational needs. She is co-founder and chief executive officer of Sky Badger, a charity that helps disabled children and their families find services available to them.
Ity was set up by Ms Barek and three other mothers in 2011, all with children with disabilities or with life-limiting conditions. To date, it has helped more than 320,000 families.
“I’m doing all of this because I don’t want anyone else to struggle the way I had to,” writes Mrs Marek on the Sky Badger website.
Richard Mintz, who has been appointed OBE for services to philanthropy, said he the award was “wonderful recognition”.
The property investor and developer has served on the boards of several charities, including Jewish Care. He is also a governor of JFS and Immanuel College.
Mr Mintz became inspired by the need to help vulnerable people get on their feet, rather than offer charity.
“It is important for them to receive the maximum amount of dignity, as a human being,” he said.
Professor Michael Goodyer was appointed OBE for services to psychiatry research. He is professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at Cambridge University.
Lieutenant Colonel Mordaunt Cohen, the most senior Jewish war veteran in the UK, has been appointed MBE for services to Second World War education.
At the age of 101, he is the oldest recipient of an honour in the list.
Sunderland-born Lt Col Cohen said he was “deeply humbled and honoured” and dedicated his award to his comrades who paid the ultimate sacrifice.
“As the years go by, there are fewer of us around to tell our story. I look forward to continuing to educate as many people as possible in the years ahead, health permitting.
“As a British Jewish veteran, I’m especially proud of the immense contribution made by the 60,000 Jewish soldiers who served our country in World War Two.”
Lt Col Cohen enlisted in 1940 and saw action in Nigeria and Burma and was mentioned in dispatches for bravery.
A solicitor in civilian life, he served on the executive of the Sunderland Hebrew Congregation, and was appointed the shul’s honorary Life President in 1988. He is vice-president of the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and Women.
Professor Michael Levin was appointed MBE for services to infectious diseases, critical care and research. He is professor of paediatrics and international child health at Imperial College London and St Mary’s Hospital. The award came as a “total shock”, he said, stressing that it recognised the collaborative work he has carried out with colleagues. “I’ve been privileged to work as a part of a wonderful team, looking after seriously ill children,” he said.
For several years, he has been leading work to develop a blood test to distinguish between viral and bacterial illnesses in children, allowing infections such as meningitis, septicaemia or pneumonia to be easily identified, and caught more rapidly.
Morris Bright has been appointed MBE for services to local government.
He said he was “very surprised, and humbled,” adding that he was indebted to his colleagues. “You’re only as good as the people around you.”
A Conservative councillor on Hertsmere Borough Council since 1999, and council leader since 2007, Mr Bright said his mantra was “to leave a place in a better condition than you find it”.
Leonie Lewis, who has been appointed MBE for services to the London Jewish community, is vice-chair of the Faiths Forum in London, and a vicepresident of the United Synagogue.
She said: “I’m honoured to receive the award. I’ve worked in the community for over 35 years and I’m proud to be the first director of the largest faith-based volunteer organisation, the Jewish Volunteering Network.”
Dr Martin Stern, who has been appointed MBE, is one of 12 people on the list to be honoured for services to Holocaust education
Originally from Holland, he was sheltered by a Dutch couple after the Nazi occupation, but was arrested and
sent to Theresienstadt. After the war, he joined relatives in Manchester and qualified as a doctor, becoming an immunologist and an authority on asthma.
Now in his seventies and retired, he gives talks to schools about his wartime experiences. In a 2010 interview, he said the only hope of preventing future genocides was to “immunise every child against the tendency to hate others and to regard others as inferior”. Andrew Kaufman, 71, chair of the Association of Jewish Refugees, was also appointed MBE for Holocaust education.
He said: “As the son of two refugees who fled Nazi oppression and rebuilt their lives in Britain, I feel hugely honoured and enormously proud to have been nominated and to accept this wonderful award, which I shall deeply treasure, on behalf of everyone at the AJR.”
Mr Kaufman has been a leading advocate of the creation of the AJR’s Refugee Voices testimony archive, a collection of 225 transcribed interviews with refugees and survivors recorded for posterity.
Bernd Koschland was appointed MBE for his work in Holocaust education. Born near Nuremberg, Germany, in 1931 into an Orthodox family, he escaped the Holocaust on the Kindertransport in 1939, settling in the UK.
He trained as a Jewish minister, becoming Reverend Koschland and joining Kingston Synagogue in south London. He left his shul role for fulltime teaching, working at JFS and the City of London School for Girls, before retiring in 1995.
He was also Jewish chaplain at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead.
He has said: “I believe strongly that, despite the past, life must carry on, that you must do something useful with your life. Today, speaking about the Holocaust and the Kindertransport is part of the lives of many who survived.
“It is so important that memories of the Holocaust, and the Kindertransport are passed on to the next generation and not forgotten.”
Hannah Lewis, appointed MBE for her Shoah education work, survived a labour camp in Poland and came to Britain in 1949. She lives in London and has given talks in schools and universities for several years, providing an insight into the enduring impact of the Holocaust.
Joan Salter, who has been appointed MBE for services to Holocaust education,
was born Fanny Zimetbaum in Brussels in 1940. She managed to escape the Nazis by fleeing with her mother and sister to Spain, having been smuggled out of Paris hidden in a laundry van.
Mrs Salter now lives in London and regularly shares her testimony in schools and colleges across the country.
Antony Goodman has been appointed MBE for services to international trade and exports. With a career in commerce spanning more than 30 years, he is chief executive of kosher food company Yumsh Snacks Ltd.
Also appointed MBE was Lucy Marks, chief executive and clinical psychologist at Compass Wellbeing, a healthcare provider in Tower Hamlets in East London. She was nominated for services to children’s mental health and primary care.
Moira Newton was appointed MBE for services to the Jewish community in North London.
Czech-born Josef Perl
was awarded a British Empire Medal (BEM) for Holocaust education work. He survived numerous concentration camps including Auschwitz. Now living in Hertfordshire, he regularly spoke to students and groups about his experiences, until his retirement in 2009. He has also written a memoir, Faces in the Smoke.
Another BEM recipient for Holocaust education was Janine Webber. Born in Poland, she survived the war by disguising her Jewish identity. She lives in London and is regularly invited by schools to share her experiences.
Harry Bibring also received the BEM for Holocaust education work. Born in Vienna in 1925, he and his sister escaped the Nazis on the Kindertransport to Britain. In an interview with the BBC in 2015, he said he never told anyone about his story until an invitation came from a rabbi to talk about his life to students at a local school.
Retired tailor Harry Spiro, 88, said he was delighted to learn he had been awarded a BEM for services to Holocaust education, although he said he “never did it to get an award”.
A survivor of Theresienstadt, he has spent the past 15 years speaking in schools. He said: “Sometimes the children do not understand why I do not hold a grudge. But when do you stop hating and start living?
“I have been very lucky, but the biggest luck was meeting the right person — my wife Pauline.”
Leslie Kleinman, another BEM recipient for Holocaust education work, was interned at Auschwitz but escaped the gas chambers by lying about his age.
It was while recuperating in an American-run hospital after the war that he was selected as one of 1,000 child survivors to settle in Britain.
He is still involved in Shoah education, lecturing at schools around the country. He said: “It was, and remains, important to me that something positive should be taken from my time in Auschwitz and that all the years of suffering should not be in vain.”
Freda Wineman said she felt “great pride” to be recognised with a BEM for giving school talks on the Holocaust for the past 25 years. Mrs Wineman, who was born in France in 1923, survived Auschwitz and Theresienstadt.
Dr Chaim Olmer also received a BEM in recognition of his talks to school children. He was sent to Buchenwald concentration camp, before being moved to Theresienstadt, where he was liberated by the Russian army in May 1945.
He qualified as a dentist after arriving in Glasgow in 1945, and went on to serve in the British Army.
Now 90, he said his family were very happy at the award. “But it doesn’t mean an awful lot,” he added.
“What’s important is telling people about the Holocaust so no one experiences it again.”
Maryon Stewart, who founded the Angelus Foundation to raise awareness of the danger of drugs, has been awarded a BEM for services to drug education.
She established the foundation after her 21-year-old daughter Hester died from a legal high in 2009, and campaigned for seven years for a ban on the open sale of legal highs, finally succeeding in 2016 when the Psychoactive Substances Act was passed.
She said: “This is a very special, yet sad, day for me, as I’d love to share it with Hester.”
Adrian Jacobs, a volunteer police liaison with the Metropolitan Police, has been awarded a BEM for services to interfaith relations and the community in the London Borough of Barnet.
Shimon Fhima was appointed MBE for services to taxpayers. Mr Fhima is deputy director, transformation at HM Revenue and Customs, a key role in developing digital programmes.
As the years go by there are fewer of us around to tell our story’