News
MBE for Open Arms co-founder
John Lancaster in Her Majesty’s New Year’s Honours list
Open
Arms International co-founder Dr John Lancaster received the perfect start to
2011 – an honour from the Queen.
In
Her Majesty's New Year Honours list, John received an MBE for helping the
plight of poverty-stricken and HIV and Aids victims. And he dedicated the
prestigious award to his wife, Rosemary, who he said had always been
"remarkably supportive".
John, who set up conservatory firm Ultraframe in 1983 before selling the
business in 2006, has always dedicated time to local charity projects and set
up the Lancaster Foundation.
He said: "I am humbled to receive this honour and give thanks to God for
an amazing journey. When we decided to extend our charity work into Africa in
1998, our first trip proved to be an experience and our lives changed forever.
To see at first hand the suffering and poverty, hearing stories of tremendous
courage from living on the edge. Our hearts were moved and helped in the
planning and building of the village.
He added: "I want to publicly dedicate this honour to Rosemary, as the
charity is a joint commitment and without her total support in my life –
sharing business and life's pressure, especially when I made mistakes – I
could never have achieved the level of business success that has enabled us to
transform our charity commitments."
