A HERO of the campaign to save Terry's suffered a heart attack within hours of taking it to a union's national conference, it emerged today.

Vic Botterill, chief shop steward at the York chocolate factory, took to the rostrum at the GMB's conference in Scarborough earlier this month to make an impassioned appeal for support from delegates.

He told them how hundreds of jobs and a great York chocolate manufacturing tradition were set to be lost through plans to close the factory and transfer production abroad, with a severe effect on people working there.

He spoke of the union's campaign, backed by the Evening Press, to persuade the company to keep production going in the York area through a move to a new purpose-built factory, winning applause from delegates.

But Vic, 57, has now revealed how he started feeling ill on the way back. "I had felt fine at the conference but was getting pains which were getting worse," he said.

He eventually went to a Terry's doctor, and tests later revealed that he had suffered a heart attack.

He then underwent a quadruple heart bypass operation using veins from his leg, and recently returned home.

He said he would have to spend a couple of months convalescing, away from the stresses of the campaign to save the factory.

He said he had wondered if the stress of going to the conference had led to the attack, but had been assured that it was purely coincidence.

He said he had previously undergone an angioplasty and been given a stent, and this had then rejected, causing the attack. He was already feeling much better since undergoing the operation, although he had deep chest scars.

Updated: 10:09 Monday, May 31, 2004