Saints & sinners
IT’S heartening that the King’s New Year’s Honours list has rewarded some of those who truly help to make Britain great.
Rugby league legends Kevin Sinfield and Rob Burrow have captured the hearts of the nation raising more than £9 million for Motor Neurone Disease research and well deserve their upgraded gongs.
There are popular honours too for other sporting greats, old and new, and timely rewards for some of those who have long enriched our cultural lives.
It’s hard to imagine stuffy honours committees of the past making bonkbuster author Jilly Cooper a Dame, Glastonbury founder Michael Eavis a Knight, Soccer Saturday presenter Jeff Stelling an MBE or Bake Off star Paul Hollywood an OBE.
There is also welcome recognition for some who achieved great things from tragic situations.
We too salute Tony Hudgell, nine, who raised £2 million to fight the kind of child abuse that cost him his legs; Diana Parkes and Hetti Barkworth-Nanton for their campaign to keep the killer of Diana’s daughter Joanna Simpson behind bars; and Ian Russell who has fought for better child safety online after the death of daughter Molly.
Yet there are still some baffling awards.
Passport Office boss Abi Tierney gets the Order of the Bath after presiding over a massive applications backlog while working from home more than 100 miles from her HQ. Order of the boot might have been more appropriate.
And epidemiologist Professor John Edmunds — who argued for ruinous Covid lockdowns to be extended even longer — has been knighted.
What would his reward have been if he hadn’t been completely wrong? A coronation?
Nato’s front line
THE latest deadly blitz of Ukrainian civilian targets by evil Vladimir Putin is a stark reminder why the West must not relax its whole-hearted backing for Ukraine.
Thousands of British troops will deploy in days to assume command of Nato’s Very High Readiness Joint Task force.
In theory they will lead Europe’s first line of defence if Russia should attack any Nato ally.
But Ukrainians are already giving their lives to hold back Putin’s imperialist ambitions, defending their country and — by proxy — us.
We owe them all the help they need — 200 air defence missiles is a good start.
End of bullies
DANGEROUS dogs have killed a record 16 Britons this year.
Now vets warn lethal XL Bullys could be dumped by reckless owners ahead of a ban on the breed from February 1.
It is a crime from tomorrow to abandon the killer animals.
Anyone who does must be held to account for endangering lives.
