Celebrating our community

On Wednesday evening, along with many of you, I watched our Annual Community Awards Ceremony (YouTube), excellently hosted by local celebrity Tim Vine.

It was heartwarming to hear the stories of individuals, groups and organisations who all contributed to our community in the past year. For the second year running, it had to be virtual, but it did not detract from the overall celebrations.

A total of 150 nominations were received under the theme Recover and Rebuild - the judging panel did not have an easy task! It is not possible to write about all of the winners, but I want to highlight just a few:

Environmental Champion

This award went to local resident Andrea Eckhardt-Smith. Andrea is a member of the Wandle Trust, Carshalton Community allotments, and a member of Culvers Retreat Residents Association.

She has been involved in the planting of over 150 saplings and fruit trees provided by Social Orchards. She can often be seen in Beddington Park carrying out litter picks and this is in fact where I first met Andrea. She is full of energy and passionate about her local environment. In her video clip she thanked the Council and Sutton Housing Partnership for appreciating the work of local residents.

Outstanding Volunteer

I was impressed with the amount of activities the winner was involved in. Peter Struick said that when he retired he thought about how he could help in his local community.

He is now Chair of Sutton Soup, a Friend of Sutton Green and Rosehill Park, and a member of Sutton New town and Sutton Civic Society. In addition, he is an avid photographer and is now the “official” photographer for Wallington Music Festival. I have seen some of the photographs that Peter posts on Facebook and they are always interesting and liked by many.

Outstanding Voluntary Group

Listening to some statistics from this group, it was clear why they won this award. The Nonsuch Covid Marshalls recruited by Sutton Volunteer Centre during the pandemic carried out over 10,000 hours of work and 27,000 vaccinations were delivered.

This group of 186 volunteers worked through the rain and snow, though some were lucky enough to be on a shift when the sun shone. Members were grateful for all the snacks and drinks donated to them to keep them going. I heard lots of stories from people going to Nonsuch for their vaccinations - all said how welcoming, caring and kind the volunteers were and how they made their appointment go smoothly. Many of those volunteers have now gone on to do other volunteering roles in the community.

These awards demonstrate what wonderful residents and organisations we have in Sutton. All the people nominated are selfless and do not do what they do for recognition or reward, but simply because they want to give something back to the community they live in and create better lives for others. 

Thank you to all of them.

Councillor Marian James