Western Daily Press (Saturday)
OBE kicks off new chapter for city mayor
THE Mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees, has received an OBE in the New Year’s Honours list. The Labour politician, who was the first directly-elected black mayor in Europe when he was voted into office at City Hall in 2016, was made Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for “services to local government”.
Mr Rees’s honour is one of several for local politicians in the Bristol area to receive honours in the New Year’s list.
Portishead’s Nigel Ashton, who led North Somerset Council for 12 years up to 2019, has also received an OBE, and Sanjay Shambhu, a councillor on South Gloucestershire Council and the chair of BAME Conservatives, has received the British Empire Medal for political service.
Like Cllr Shambu, the Mayor is listed alongside others honoured in Gloucestershire as he now lives in South Gloucestershire and the honours system uses ceremonial counties for the New Year Honours List.
Being named in the New Year Honours list begins 2024 positively for Mr Rees, who faces a big change in the year to come. His time as mayor will come to an end in May 2024, and his hopes of becoming an MP received a blow when he was defeated in a ballot of Labour Party members living in the new Bristol North East constituency, to become the Labour candidate for the new seat at the next general election.
Community stalwarts and people who have devoted their lives to work in the community have been honoured, including Pamela Wingfield, the founder and principal of the Wingfield School of Ballet and Dance in Little Stoke, has received a British Empire Medal, as has Norman Mitchell, the chair of trustees at Lockleaze Sports Centre, for services to sport in Bristol.
Timothy Hewer, a beekeeper from Little Stoke in South Gloucestershire has also received a BEM, as has Robert Collins, from Wraxall, near Bristol, who is the founder of Pass It On Young Sports voluntary youth organisation.
Prof John Iredale, pictured inset, has been knighted for services to medical research. The professor of medical science at the University of Bristol has recently returned to the university after being seconded the to UK’s Medical Research Council as its interim chair.
He said the award recognised the teams he has worked with.
“I have had the good fortune to work in great UK universities, our NHS and had the opportunity to contribute to both the MRC and charitable sectors. It has been hugely rewarding and exciting, but in all of these organisations, it has been my privilege to work with the most extraordinary teams and this award also recognises and reflects their outstanding work. Science is a team sport,” he added.
Another Bristol University professor has been honoured with a CBE. Historian Prof Ronald Hutton is a familiar face on a range of TV programmes.
“This is a tremendous honour, and I am delighted above all to bring a little further distinction to the university in which I have spent most of my working life,” he said. Professor Hutton is a leading authority on the history of the British Isles in the 16th and 17th centuries, ancient and medieval paganism and magic, British folklore, and the global context of witchcraft beliefs.
Other local recipients of an OBE include Dr Ruth Cromie, from the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, Dr Kathryn Marks, the deputy director of the Environment Agency – for services to “flood risk management and to equality, diversity and inclusion” – and Samantha
Mayhew, from Nailsea, who is the SEND assistant principal at Weston College.
Dr Teame Mebrahtu has been awarded an OBE for services to education, to refugees and to the community in Bristol, and Amy Perrin, the founder of the Marmalade Trust, the charity that tries to combat loneliness
in older people, will also receive an OBE.
Bristol-based artist Valda Jackson, who has a studio at the Spike Island Artspace, is to receive an MBE for services to art. Earlier this year, she designed the new 50p piece which commemorated the 75th anniversary of the arrival of the Windrush.