Mid Ulster councillor honoured as 'local hero'

Ulster Unionist councillor George Shiels was honoured along with the others at an exclusive gala dinner on board the renowned SS Nomadic in Belfast on Thursday.

The Community Works campaign, which is now in its third year, seeks out groups and individuals from across Northern Ireland who gives up their time and efforts for a cause that is both close to their hearts and the hearts of their local communities.

Anne Molloy from Enniskillen has been unveiled as the overall ‘Local Lidl Hero’ of 2016 at an exclusive gala event to celebrate the culmination of Lidl’s Community Works campaign.

As part of the campaign, Lidl Northern Ireland set out in September to search for the region’s most deserving local heroes - those who give up their time and effort for a cause close to their heart. Shoppers were asked to nominate individuals from their local community who merited recognition, from which 38 inspirational people were chosen as Local Lidl Heroes’.

Overall winner Ms Molloy is vice principal of St. Paul’s Primary School in Enniskillen and was presented with the award in acknowledgement of the outstanding dedication she has shown to her local community over the last 30 years. Known not only for contributing to academia, Anne also volunteers for local sports teams, music groups and church activities and continues to display a relentless commitment to showing care and compassion to everyone she meets.

Conor Boyle, Regional Director,at Lidl Northern Ireland, said: “At Lidl we take great pride in supporting the communities in and around our stores and we’re thrilled to have been able to recognise all our ‘Lidl Local Heroes’ at this special event. Each person nominated plays an incredibly important role in their local community and we’ve been humbled by their stories.”

He continued, “Over the past year, Lidl’s Community Crew has travelled the length and breadth of Northern Ireland and have met some fantastic people and community groups along the way. We would like to take this opportunity to say a big thank you to all who have been involved in this journey and have helped make Lidl’s Community Works campaign a resounding success.”

The 38 winning ‘Local Lidl Heroes’ were honoured for their inspirational work at the exclusive gala event. There were also two runners up,awarded to the late Anne Attwood from Cookstown. Anne’s daughter, Christine, graciously accepted her mother’s accolade on her behalf, which was awarded to Anne for the continued support she showed her local community by running a charity cancer shop in Cookstown and setting up recreational classes for individuals recovering from cancer. The other runner up was awarded to Anne Steele from Ballymoney who launched ‘The Open Door’ drop-in centre in 2014 - a place of comfort and refuge for homeless people and people suffering from depression.

The community works campaign launched in early 2016 and had two phases, Lidl’s search for a ‘Local LidlHero’ followed on from phase one which saw Lidl shoppers nominating local community groups and projects they felt deserved a helping hand from the Lidl Community Crew.

From nearly 4500 nominations, 33 groups were selected as winners, since then the Community Works Crew travelled the region visiting a total of 152 winning and runner-up groups and awarded over £180,000 in financial contributions and Lidl products to the groups.