ONE of the county's biggest champions for racial awareness and equality Waqar Azmi, who lives in Barnt Green, has been awarded an OBE in the Queen's Jubilee Birthday Honours List.

And Derek Spooner from Blackwell, one of the founders of the Primrose Hospice, also gets an OBE for his services in designing hospices.

Mr Azmi, the former chief executive of Worcestershire Racial Equality Council based in Worcester, has been honoured for his work for ethnic communities.

Aged 32, and with a PhD in race relations, he gave up his role in Worcester last October to work for a global consultancy in Birmingham.

Over a five-year period he became a prominent voice in the community and gained much respect for his tact and diplomacy in dealing with racial equality.

Such was his standing nationwide, last year he was appointed one of six members of an independent panel whose job it was to examine the causes of the Oldham riots.

He also stood for Labour in West Worcestershire in last year's General Election.

Retired Derek Spooner, 73, said he is delighted to be honoured.

He began work as an 18-year old junior clerk in a hospital in his native Brighton.

Later he moved to Birmingham to take up a post in the planning department at the famous Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

His interest turned to hospices when he was asked to plan the new St Mary's Hospice in Selly Park, one of the first in the country.

This led to him being invited to undertake planning hospices on behalf of Macmillan Cancer Relief throughout the UK.

His work for them has taken him all over the world including Moscow where he helped launch the city's first hospice.

He said: " I am very grateful to the many people who I have met and worked with over the years.