Cause of pride

I didn't know Paul Cooper when we sat down at our table but by the end of the night I was cheering and hugging him. Paul, a dignified and unassuming man who was named Volunteer of the Year, has worked unstintingly on behalf of people who have suffered the consequences of exposure to asbestos. He has been doing it since 1978, when the first of his friends at the carriageworks started dying. His recognition has been a long time coming.

The awards ceremony at the Ebor Suite at Knavesmire was a fantastically smart affair with a stage and large-screen TV behind it. What with the swirling lights playing across the audience, ticker tape and a suspended net full of red, white and blue balloons that was eventually persuaded to shower its contents, it only needed a chorus of The Star Spangled Banner to turn it into a Republican Party rally.

Having had a fluttery moment when BBC Look North presenter Harry Gration announced the shortlist for our category - my group, the Young Friends of Rowntree Park, had been shortlisted for Best Community Project - I can now appreciate how nominees Hilary Swank and Cate Blanchett must have felt when they were waiting to hear whether their names would be read out for this year's Oscars.

We didn't win - congratulations to Low Moor Allotments Association, who did - but I didn't mind. Being a finalist was an achievement in itself.

After three years of running our group, which we started from scratch, it was great to feel that all our hard work was appreciated. It doesn't take a posh dinner to do that - happy children's faces are all we need - but being selected for a Community Pride award is confirmation that we're doing something people approve of.

It was profoundly humbling to share the occasion with inspirational people such as Professor Andy Smith, who teaches sports science and has overcome a brain tumour. He was named York Community Pride Person of the Year and his comments about the value of sport in uniting communities gathered much applause and, along with Paul Cooper's moving speech, not a few tears.

I had never expected the event to be so emotional. After the three children with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (Louis Connell, Joseph Powell and Kayleigh Nicholson) were all named Child of the Year, there wasn't a dry eye in the house.

By the end of the night I had cried more than Gwyneth Paltrow and Halle Berry put together. The organisers - the Evening Press and City of York Council - must have anticipated this, because tissues had been provided on every table and we all made good use of them.

There was a great deal of talk about unsung heroes but what really marked the winners out was the fact that they didn't see themselves like that. They were modest, hard-working, genuine individuals, some of whom had triumphed over what life had dealt them and some of whom had simply felt compelled to do something.

They didn't do what they did for personal or political gain and they weren't out for glory, either. They just wanted, in their own small way, to make the world a better, fairer place.

There were others who would have done well to follow their example, including an opportunistic campaigner at our table who ligged and lobbied and used the occasion for ruthless self-promotion with an effrontery that appalled me and my colleagues.

As to the clique of councillors, who kept to their own table, this would have been an invaluable opportunity to really share the experiences of the community they were supposed to be there to celebrate. Presumably, since council leader Steve Galloway was among them, they had formed a cordon to protect him against militant bread-roll throwers.

Still, I came away from the evening with fresh enthusiasm, something I've lacked recently. All too often people running voluntary groups get worn out by the work involved and give up, exhausted and disillusioned. I clocked more than 200 unpaid hours in one particularly strenuous three-month period alone and, because of this, I had planned to give it up.

We advertised widely for volunteers to take over but no one came forward, with the result that at our last AGM I somehow found myself re-elected. I'm not sure how it happened, but I was secretly glad. There are so many things I want to do with the group and I don't want to see it fold.

But we need more help. I'm not in this to be noble and self-sacrificing and it's taken a significant toll on my own work and on family life.

Why do I do it? Because I love it and I believe in what we do. We need others to do that, too. When everyone comes together, that's what real community pride is all about.

A supplement featuring all the York Community Pride winners is published with the Evening Press on Tuesday.

Updated: 10:33 Saturday, October 22, 2005