New Year's Honours announced

Key figures in the community are among those who have been singled out in the New Year's Honours list.

Among those who have been honoured are:

MRS SHAHINA BALOCH JOHNSON                     50  yrs old

(DEVIZES, WILTSHIRE)

For services to the Arts and Creative Industries in Swindon and Wiltshire

She has over 20 years’ experience in Arts Management and Media Production mostly spent as Chief Executive Officer of Create studios in Swindon (formally known as Mobile Media). Create is a Black and minority ethnic led organisation with a 30 year track record specialising in using digital arts as an engagement tool with socially excluded communities. She has led Create over the last 10 years through its transition to a Social Enterprise embracing all digital media and transformed its role as a leading organisation in the regeneration of Swindon.  In 2015 she joined the Swindon and Wiltshire Local Economic Partnership (LEP) to help drive economic growth into the area. She is the only BAME representative and has been recognised as the diversity champion on the LEP.  In 2015 she joined the Board of Trustees of the Watershed Arts Trust in Bristol, where she is recognised as the diversity and children and young people’s expert. She goes above and beyond what is expected of her as the Director of Create Studios, to benefit the wider creative sector and communities in Swindon and Wiltshire.

CAPT (RTD) SANTA PUN                                         61  yrs old

(HIGHWORTH, WILTSHIRE)

Staff Officer, Army Division, Defence Academy. For services to Defence

He left the British Army in 2001 after 27 years in the Ghurkas and has been the Co-ordination Staff Officer in the Army Division at the Defence Academy since the Intermediate Command and Staff Course (Land) was established in 2004. The intensive, 30-week course trains over 400 newly-promoted majors in the Army and Royal Marines every year. It has a small headquarters staff of five and his role provides critical coordination between the staff and the many organisations that support the course and the headquarters of the Joint Services Command and Staff College. He has a gravitas and authority well beyond his military rank, frequently attends meetings in which he is the most junior representative, yet invariably punches above his weight. His delightful charm and immense knowledge impart a quiet authority which indicates that the course is in safe hands. His corporate knowledge and advice has been essential to the success of Army Division. A meticulous worker and utterly reliable he continues to uphold the very highest standards of the Ghurkas.

MR CHRISTOPHER CHARLES LOVEDAY           66  yrs old

(MARLBOROUGH, WILTSHIRE)

For services to Children, to People with Mental Health Issues and the community in Swindon

For over the past 40 years, he has committed to unpaid, voluntary fundraising work for vulnerable children and people with mental health problems in his community. He has contributed at a national level with the NSPCC having replicated his Swindon model of local collaboration - as established during the set-up of his own charity, Swindon Business Cares for Children (SBCC) in 1992 and have also used his methods to raise funds across Britain. The model he has created, employed by the NSPCC, is thought to have raised an estimated millions of pounds indirectly for the NSPCC, a feat that has been formally recognised by the NSPCC who made him an honorary member of the Council in 1997. Approximately 1500 vulnerable children have been helped through his involvement with the NSPCC in the last 20 years, including through the creation of the NSPCC's Swindon Protection Centre for abused children. He has also raised over £250,000 for a local mental health charity, Theraputic Work in Gardening in Swindon (TWIGS), which have been vital to its survival. He is a quiet and yet determined man who has achieved extraordinary things in his local community of Swindon.

MR JOHN CHARLES COX                                  72 yrs old    (BRADFORD ON AVON, WILTSHIRE)

For services to Scouting and to Holy Trinity Church, Bradford on Avon

Since 1996 he has been the Chair of the West Wiltshire District Scout Committee. When the Scouts required a new permanent camp site, after the old site was being developed on, he raised £250,000 to buy a new plot of land. He also obtained 8000 trees and organised the planting of them. The Jubilee Camp site provides an area where over 900 Scouts, along with schools and other youth organisations can enjoy themselves in a social environment. For 10 years he has been the Chair of the Friends of Holy Trinity. Working alongside architects and project managers he has raised money to renovate and improve the profile of the 12th century church. For a number of years he has played a leading role in organising the Annual Street Market, a key event in Bradford on Avon in the summer, in which local businesses and small charities participate. The money raised from the market goes towards the wellbeing of the community.