Memorial service for leading figure in SW

AMEMORIAL service is to be held to honour a popular Devon councillor, businessman and farmer who died earlier this year.

Sir Simon Day, a highly influential figure in the Westcountry, passed away peacefully at home on January 12 aged 88.

Among many other things, Sir Simon was Conservative leader of Devon County Council, head of the West Country Television consortium and also stood three times for Parliament.

The memorial service to celebrate his life will be held at Exeter Cathedral on Tuesday, May 28, starting at noon.

As reported in the Telegraph at the time of his death, Sir Simon was a county councillor for 49 years, led the council in the early 1990s and chaired it in 2001-02, as well as chairing bodies ranging from the Devon & Cornwall Police Authority to the Association of Sea Fisheries Committees for England and Wales.

“He had strong business interests in the region, chairing West of England Newspapers from 1981 to 1986 and being a director of Plymouth Sound Radio and Exeter International Airport”, it adds.

Born on January 22 1935, he did his National Service in the Royal Navy from 1954 to 1956, then read history at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, before farming in his own right at Ivybridge.

He was first elected to Devon County Council in 1964, representing Modbury and later Salcombe, and served until 2013, when he was elected an honorary alderman. Harbouring national political ambitions, he fought Carmarthen at the 1966 general election and North Cornwall in 1970.

Sir Simon Day

Away from politics, Sir Simon was a livestock farmer and at various times served as president of the South Devon Herd Book Society and Devon County Show. He also chaired the governors of Bicton College of Agriculture, and was a member of the court of Exeter University. Receiving a knighthood in 1997, Sir Simon was High Sheriff of Devon for 1999-2000, as well as a hereditary Freeman of the City of Norwich.

Sir Simon was also a keen sailor, and with his fellow Devon landowner Lord Clinton – who recently passed away on April 2, aged 89 – he bought and shared for many years a motorboat, Apollyon. Other close friends included the Poet Laureate Ted Hughes and Michael (Lord) Heseltine, who first met Sir Simon in 1965 after being selected as the Conservative candidate for Tavistock.

Lord Heseltine told the Telegraph: “He was always amiable, friendly and courteous and very good on subjects if they interested him. From that time I shot with him once a year and he was a true friend of the Westcountry and its countryside.”

He was always amiable, friendly and courteous and very good on subjects if they interested him LORD HESELTINE

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