Hospice founder honoured to win lifetime award

The founder of St Nicholas Hospice Care has won a lifetime achievement award for his work with the charity spanning more than 30 years.

Canon Richard Norburn was honoured at the Suffolk High Sheriff’s Awards on Thursday night.

Canon Norburn has spent more than 55 years in the Anglican ministry in Suffolk. His greatest voluntary work, however, has been for the hospice, which he helped to found.

The 82-year-old was inspired to set up the charity in the early 1980s after witnessing the suffering of three families.

Having visited a hospice being built in Stafford, he returned with the conviction to bring his vision to life.

“I feel so humbled to have received this award,” he said. “It is wonderful to have been part of the hospice for all of this time and to have seen it grow.”

Canon Norburn was nominated by hospice chief executive Barbara Gale, who said: “It is a real privilege to still have our founding father so involved.

“He’s such an inspiration, so supportive and so forward-thinking.

“While the hospice would not survive without the support of the community, the events they undertake, the legacies they leave and the hundreds of thousands of hours volunteers have put in over the years – it would not be here at all without Richard.”