Honouring the veterans

I've been invited to join Harlow's Member of Parliament to help present the Veterans' Service Lapel Badge to a number of local veterans, in an event at the Civic Centre. I arrive at about twenty past five to make sure I'm on time for the five thirty start, to find Nick and most of the recipients and their families already there.

The MP introduces the event, and explains the significance of the Badge. I say a few words about how important it is that the community publicly remembers the courage and service of our veterans. And then we call each recipient (or their representative) up individually to receive their Badge: Mr Ferry, Mr Bailey, Mr Muggeridge, Mr Eaton, Mr Hartley, Mr Janes, Mr Wright, Mr Lawrence, Mr Rodd, Mr Harvey, Mr Brooker, Mr Collins, Mr Letherbarrow, Mr Hourigan, Mr Long, Mr Treadwell, Mr Selfe, Mr Dent, Mrs Dent, Mr Lee, and the relatives of Mr Ceely. It's humbling to meet them all and remember the service they've given their country.

A cup of tea is just what is needed at such an event, so we adjourn downstairs to one of the committee rooms, where cups and saucers and cakes are waiting. There's a coffee and tea machine - one of those ones that you have to post the sachet into and it almost bites your fingers off, and if you forget to put the cup under the spout it all dribbles into the drip tray at the bottom. Each cup takes about half a minute to make, and the inexorable laws of mathematics suggest that it'll therefore take about twenty minutes to finish serving our guests. I do duty at the machine, posting sachets and placing cups, while Nick and one of the MP's staff rush round the tables with the filled cups of tea and coffee and put out little saucers of UHT milk and sachets of sugar.

When everyone's served, we have a little time to talk to the veterans and their families. I'm thrilled to find that one gentleman present was actually involved in the liberation of my home island of Jersey - he tells me how he arrived off St Brelade's Bay on 7 May (the island was liberated on 9 May), and I tell him how my Mum for many years organised the annual remembrance of Liberation Day at the island's memorial to the slave workers of the Occupation.

We gather for a group photo at the foot of the stairs leading to the council chamber, and then disperse for the weekend.