In April 2007 BBC South announced that they were going to run their Community Champions Awards for the regions unsung heroes after a two year absence. Having been commended in 2005, Cathy decided to nominate our secretary Nic Holc-Thompson for an award to thank him for all his work in keeping the charity going. Unknown to her, several members had decided to nominate the charity in saying thank you for all she had done for them.
The first we knew that we had been successful when one of the Volunteers Carol Bath rang to say that she had had a phone call from Georgina Windsor asking when the group was next meeting as the BBC would like to come along and film a short piece. Within a day Cathy had received the Invitation to the award ceremony and another set of phone calls asking to do the filming. In discussions with the BBC they admitted they had never received so many nominations for the same group in a number of categories and had had a great deal of difficulty in narrowing it down to a single nomination.
As the Inspirability Support Course was just about to finish its run we had to ask St Thomas Church Bedhampton if they minded the event being filmed in the church and had to ask the BBc to phone them to give re-assurances that it would not be too intrusive.
Unfortunately Georgina Windsor was unwell on the date of the filming, so a young fledgling reporter called Elanor had to pick it up at the last minute. To the obvious delight of the group they stayed for the whole of the session, filming just about everyone and everything who took part in the course. It was at this session that our newest member, Inspire made his debut being presented to Cathy whilst she tried to do the presentation. The result was a one minute short film which can be seen below. This is shown Courtesy of BBC South who kindly made the film available to us.
In order to make sure that Cathy could reach the event, the Charity decided that she would have to spend the night in the DE Vere Hotel, Southampton itself. This way she would be able to enjoy the ceremony rather than be in too much pain that it would be a struggle. Everyone else would be making their own way there but it still took all of them to persuade her to come out and down for the ceremony.
When we saw the seating plan there was a slight moment of relief, as we were based at the back of the hall and Cathy said "Well they are not going to make me wheelchair all the way down to the front, are they?". An unexpected guest which they hadn't planned seating for was Inspire who had to spend much of the meal sitting on the table next to the flowers. He was resplendant in a new dinner suit so he was the smartest dressed of all of us.
The Awards ceremony was just about to start when Cathy decided that it was necessary to take a comfort break. Whilst she was in there I was met by two of the organisers who were panicing that she wouldnt be in here seat in time by the ceremony started with Sally Taylor and Esther Rantzen who would be presenting the Awards.
The agony in waiting wasn't too long as 'Awareness of Disability' category was the second one up one up. This time it was done differently with the commended people coming first before they introduce the winner. May have had something to do with the previous commended person borrowing the microphone last time. Wonder who that was? We began to get nervous as the floor walker started hovering around behind us at this point.
As Esther read out Cathy's name, and the film started rolling, she realised that there weren't feet on the wheelchair so we never got to view the film at the time. Ros stuffed Inspire into her lap so that she would have something to take her mind off When we did get to the stage Cathy said hello again to Esther and then promptly insisted that as the award was for Inspirability as well, then the whole of the group had to be photographed. Sally Taylor said if they can get up here in 5 seconds ok but this is a one off and its just for Cathy. You have never seen a group of people move so fast from the back of the hall.
Cathy was then interviewd by Allan Sinclair who naturally had to tell everyone the name of the bear which was met with a lot of applause. Despite being in a lot of pain Cathy gave a very good interview on what it was that she had hoped to achive with the group.
After all the ceremonies were over Cathy had to go back on stage for the official winners piece and photo so that a bit could be done for South Today, which you can view here
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Official photographs on this page were taken by The Southern Daily Echo, and we are indebted to them for sending them to us.
