Police welfare volunteer receives MBE

Mrs Jean Saunderson was named in the Queen's Birthday Honours List for her years of dedicated service to police welfare.

Mrs Saunderson (69), whose policeman husband was killed in a road traffic collision in 1975, has selflessly devoted most of her life on a voluntary basis to the welfare of police families.

In the mid-1970s, as a growing number of police officers were injured or killed as a result of terrorism, Mrs Saunderson was one of the first to volunteer her services to her local police welfare group in Newtownabbey.

Her role involves working with bereaved police families, dependants and pensioners, as well as injured and retired officers. For more than three decades, Mrs Saunderson has been a friend, counsellor, visitor and helper to hundreds of members of the broader police family in times of need.

Mrs Saunderson, who was also a founder member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary Widows' Association in 1980, said she was delighted to be named in the Honours List.

"I was very much surprised, but highly delighted. We have a very good welfare group and I see this as an honour for all of us," she commented.