It's a wonderful life - and it was for Tony

My favourite film is – and has been for many years – Frank Capra's 1946 masterpiece called It's A Wonderful Life.

To those who don't get it, this is just a whimsical American fantasy piece about a man who is given redemption by an incompetent angel. However, for those who do truly understand it, this is a truly uplifting film which shows how one man's life touches so many others and how no man who is truly loved can ever feel their life has been anything but a triumph.

This film kept coming back to me on Tuesday when I attended the beautiful funeral service of Tony Morgan at St Swithun's Church in Bathford.

I got to know Tony a few years ago when he was consort to one of his five beloved daughters, Loraine Morgan-Brinkhurst, when she was chairman of Bath and North East Somerset Council. Every time I met him he had the ability to make me feel like I was the most important person in the room, and his warmth, kindness and genuine love of life shone out of his eyes.

On Tuesday I realised that this quiet and unassuming man had the ability to do the same to everyone and I can honestly say I've rarely ever been as moved as I was during this quite remarkable service.

As well as an inspired and inspiring speech by Loraine herself and some beautiful words from nephew Kevin Moore and sons-in-law John Fry, Paul Allison and John Davies, the moment that really struck me was when Tony's many grandchildren went to the front of the church and paid their own incredibly moving tributes.

For someone from a relatively small family it seemed like there were dozens of these grandchildren but what really touched me was the way all of them spoke as if they were the only grandchild Tony had ever had because he clearly loved and delighted in every one of them.

Their loving words would have been heart-breaking – if they weren't completely inspiring.

As I left the service I thought again about my favourite film. It's main character George Bailey is given the chance to see what life would have been like had he not been born and when he realised the impact he'd made on others, he saw that it is, after all, a wonderful life.

For Tony Morgan it was exactly the same. As I looked around the packed church it was almost impossible to find a dry eye but this was a mixture of tears of sadness, tears of joy and tears of pride.

That is the impact that this humble man had on all around him and having not known him terribly well before the service, I felt I really knew him by the end. And my admiration soared.

It showed to me, once again, that we should not judge a man by the size of his bank balance or his home but by the size of his heart and his capacity for love.

In that context, Tony Morgan was truly a man amongst men.

How I learned how to....walk

There is not much to be said for hitting the ripe old age of 46. However, you do at least think you’ve learnt a few basic life lessons on the way to your ‘half century’.

It was, therefore, something of a shock last Friday afternoon to realise that I didn’t actually know how to walk.

This shock discovery came when I began ‘training’ for the Bath Chronicle Donor Run which is part of the British Transplant Games which is coming to the city next weekend. This fantastic competition will be bringing hundreds of people to Bath who have had many different forms of transplants and we, as a community, can join in the fun by taking part in a 3k or 5k run/walk to raise awareness of the need for people to donate their organs for future transplants.

Not being one of life’s, ahem, natural runners, I had elected to walk alongside the chairman of the local organising committee of the Transplant Games, the irrepressibly bubbly Loraine Morgan-Brinkhurst. With the daunting prospect of having to walk all of three or five kilometres we obviously needed a training session – and step forward Zoe Jackson, who runs Plan Be (see http://www.plan-be.co.uk/). Zoe is a bundle of pure energy and enthusiasm and so she seemed the ideal person to give us tips on how to walk on the not-very-wild side.

Loraine and I, resplendent in our unmissable yellow Bath Chronicle Donor Run t-shirts, decided to go to Royal Crescent/Royal Victoria Park for our hour-long training session. It seemed like a bit of a jolly jaunt for a Friday afternoon to be honest – but what we were to learn in the next 60 minutes was fascinating and when I woke on Saturday morning with one or two aches and twinges, I realised it had done me some good as well.

Zoe’s basic belief is that if you walk right, not only can you increase your fitness levels and your posture but you will instantly look and feel better and start losing inches in the places where you want to lose inches. She looked at our walks before the session – which as you can see from the pictures here were hardly what you would call ‘power walks’ – and then proceeded to give us some tips which I’m happy to pass on now so we can get the whole city ‘walking back to happiness’.

First of all you should walk through your ‘whole foot’. You should aim to walk through the pad of the heels and push off your toes so you are floating rather than putting pressure on the ground. This, apparently, is very good for something I didn’t know I had – my ‘glutes’ (or buttock muscles for those of you not in the know).

Secondly you should stabilise your hips. According to Zoe the best way to achieve this is to imagine you have a glass of water on each hip and you have to keep them full as you walk. This improves your posture and flattens your stomach. Also good for those glutes too.

Thirdly, lengthen your neck. Try to create as much distance as possible between your shoulders and earlobes. This puts your spine in the right position and reduces stiffness. And finally – possibly the visibly tricky one I think – we should use our arms when we walk to vastly increase our speed.

By the time we’d spent an hour together – and as these are two of the most spirited and fun women in Bath it was a pretty enjoyable hour! – there was no doubt about it, I was walking better and my glutes were in fine fettle. Apparently if we can keep this up we should be able to complete our walk next week with no problems at all so if you are in Bath next week and see a strange man extending his neck and using his arms like a robot walking by, give me a wave as I glide on by.

Right, I am now off to learn how to breathe.

This was in the Bath Chronicle on June 17

One of the things that makes Britain unique is the way that, through the Queen, we give awards and accolades to those who have made their mark in our communities.

Twenty years or so ago this system was often criticised as a way of merely rewarding the great and good, with the establishment looking after its own by handing them baubles and trinkets with the odd scrap thrown to the masses in the shape of an award for a footballer or a film star.

Now, however, the system has really changed and what we are seeing is a far more reflective awards system where people from every walk of life can get an equal chance of being put in the spotlight for their selfless actions.

In the Bath area we have always been fortunate to see a number of our citizens recognised but this week’s tally of ten really must be one of the best ever and reflects incredibly well on Bath and its surrounding towns and villages.

I have said countless times in these columns that I think this area produces an astonishingly high amount of good, positive people and the sheer number we can salute this week adds weight to that argument.

What the new-look honours do are to remind us of those we know about who have performed admirably but also to tell us stories of people who work incredibly hard but do so in a private way. Many of these individuals don’t think what they’re doing is special anyway but these awards let these people know that others truly appreciate what they do.

It is interesting that two of our winners – 91-year-old Irene Weller, who has worked for 32 years as a volunteer at Dorothy House Hospice, and Veronica Hoskins, who has worked tirelessly for her community in Timsbury – both told us their awards were “totally undeserved”. That says everything about them – but also says why these awards are so important; unsung heroes like these two should receive an accolade because they are inspiring others without probably even realising they are doing so.

Elsewhere it was great to see Amy Williams pick up an MBE to add to her many other post- Olympic accolades, and it was also pleasing to see awards for Audrey Swindells who set up the Bath Postal Museum 31 years ago and Michael Hill for his work with St John’s Ambulance. Working for charities is something that deserves great recognition, which is why it is pleasing to see an MBE for Frances Lewis for her work with single parents and the victims of domestic abuse.

In terms of public service our congratulations also go to Peter Freeman and Marlene Morley who picked up CBEs for their extensive work on a national level in the public service and of course to two of our biggest local political personalities – Malcolm Hanney and Loraine Morgan-Brinkhurst.

Malcolm, an intelligent, thoughtful and dedicated public servant, has picked up an OBE for his service to the South West, and his hard work in a number of fields makes him a truly worthy recipient of this award.

And I’m sure many Bathonians will be cheered to hear of Loraine’s MBE. Her incredible enthusiasm for everything she does and her overriding passion for her home city has made her one of the most effective and engaging ambassadors we have. Her public role as a councillor and a campaigner would be enough for most people but beyond that she works for so many other charities to try to raise their profile that her fingerprints are on many of the city’s success stories and she has the ability to lift the spirits of all around her. I know this award means the world to her – and she deserves this timely recognition.

Well done to our award winners.

Saluting Bath's people of 2008

As readers of the Bath Chronicle will have seen in our New Year's Day edition we have just unveiled our first ever 'People Of The Year'


The idea was to honour the people, companies and organisations who we felt had made the most dramatic impact on Bath and the surrounding towns and villages during 2008.


Of course it would have been impossible to salute everyone from our great community but we think the 70 individuals, eight events, eight companies, 11 arts shows, six sports teams and six local bands we featured represents a pretty good snapshot of just some of the 'best of Bath' in 2008.


The initial reaction to our mini ‘New Year Honours’ from nominees implies the idea has been well received so our planning for the 2009 awards begins now. And the great thing is - every single citizen/company/sports team/band etc has a chance to be nominated!


For the record, the winners of our two biggest awards – the man and woman of the year – were Grenville Jones for his work in taking the City of Bath Male Choir to TV stardom and his fantastic achievements with the Golden-Oldies and Gitte Dawson for her brilliant leadership of the King Bladud Pigs project. They are pictured here.




Elsewhere we chose winners in various categories such as Bath Rugby, Ben Rushgrove, Great Western Wine, Carol Spalding, Mike Whitaker, Susie Wright, Nicholas Coombes, Ann Garner, Martin Tracy, Paul Mattausch-Burrows, The Volt, Charlie McDonnell, Dan Biggane and the irrepressible and much-admired Loraine Morgan-Brinkhurst.


There is no room to list all the runners-up but you can find them in the Chronicle or at our website (http://www.thisisbath.co.uk/) and we truly believe all our 100 plus nominees were fully deserving of cheers.




The 2009 awards nominations are now open!