I was thrilled to see that the Queens Birthday Honours list included the names of two people I have had the privilege to work with. Catherine Johnstone was honoured for her work with the Samaritans, a role which I know was controversial at times. However before she was CEO of the Samaritans she was the CEO of a regional voluntary sector body called RAISE, which helped the sector to engage with regional government at a time when central government was attempting to provide a meaningful form of devolution. She is someone who was always willing to speak truth to power but had a knack of doing so without offending the people concerned, a challenging thing to achieve. The other is Yvonne Doyle (pictured) who for several years was also involved in the South East regional bodies. She regularly address the South East England Regional Assembly and again was an excellent challenge to help us to focus on the opportunities through the regional bodies to improve the health and well being of the 8M people whose lives we influenced. Catherine was awarded a CBE and Yvonne the Companion of the Order of the Bath, whatever that is.