Lincoln Book Festival keynote speaker forced to drop out

Those who lost their lives at war to defend our freedoms will be honoured on Remembrance Day this year, as part of a weekend of services in Lincoln.

Remembrance services have been observed since the end of the First World War in 1918, to honour armed forces members who lost their lives serving their countries in the line of duty.

It is an annual tradition for services to be held across the country, and this year is no different, as Lincoln prepares for a weekend-long Remembrance of our heroes of war.

There will be a brief service on Remembrance Day itself, Thursday, November 11, held at the war memorial on Lincoln High Street and organised by the Royal British Legion.

The service at the Lincoln War Memorial. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite

Another service will be held at the war memorial on Saturday, November 13, this time organised by City of Lincoln Council in conjunction with the Royal British Legion.

The Armistice Service will be attended by the Lord Lieutenant, the Civic Party, members of council, freemen and more, with a wreath-laying opportunity and music provided by the Lincolnshire Fire & Rescue band.

The day after, on Remembrance Sunday, Lincoln Cathedral will host its usual annual service, with the Mayor of Lincoln in attendance along with the Civic Party and members of the council.

Elsewhere in the county, West Lindsey District Council have said that the chairman will be at All Saints in Gainsborough on the morning of Remembrance Sunday, and then All Saints Parish Church in Nettleham in the afternoon for two separate services.

In North East Lincolnshire, there will be services held in Grimsby, Immingham, Laceby, New Waltham and Cleethorpes to allow people to pay tribute.

A man reportedly reached under a 14-year-old girl’s skirt and took a photograph at a shopping centre in Grantham, police said.

The girl was looking at clothes at a charity shop in the Isaac Newton Shopping Centre when the crime took place on Monday, October 25 at 9.40am.

She was then approached from behind by a man who placed his phone underneath her skirt to take a picture.

After being challenged, the man turned and ran away from the shop.

Police are now appealing to locate the man in the CCTV picture below, who has been described as having short blonde hair with a short blonde beard, having pale skin and being of thin build.

The man ran away from the shop when challenged. | Photo: Lincolnshire Police

He is thought to be in his mid-30s and was said to be wearing a dark hoody with a red emblem, as well as dark blue jeans.

If you can help identify the man in the picture, who police believe can help with enquiries, get in touch in one of the following ways:

• Call 101 and quote incident 83 of October 25
• Email [email protected] and quote the same incident number in the subject line
• Anonymously calling Crimestoppers on 0800 555111

A Lincolnshire RAF veteran who switched careers to work as a carer is campaigning against ableism and ageism in the UK job market.

Les Venus is calling for people who feel discriminated against due to their disability or age to seriously consider a job in the care sector to avoid systematic prejudices embedded within the UK job market.

The 63-year-old is now working at Home From Home Care’s Lincolnshire-based residential care homes as a personal support worker . He was on the brink of retiring in 2016 before seeing an online advert for Home From Home Care which changed his life.

He empowers adults with learning difficulties, autism and complex physical and mental health needs, and is encouraging others to join him in the care sector to do the same.

He said: “If you’re feeling underpaid, undervalued, or undermined – come to the care sector and there is a place for you. I’d never done care work in my life before this and if I’d have known about this 40 years ago, I’d have made this my career. It’s an amazing thing to do.”

Les is campaigning against ableism and ageism in the UK job market.

Les was previously an officer in the Royal Air Force for 17 years. He then movied to the business world to become a director for the property firm Henry Boot Management, and then engineering company Babcock International.

As a consultant, Les later helped the government draft its 2010 Equality Act, legislation which makes it illegal to discriminate against prospective employees on the basis of age, disability, gender or sex, race, religion, sexual orientation or partnership status.

However, Les still feels that not enough is being done to safeguard against off-the-record bigotry during the hiring process.

He said: “I think the Equality Act is a very good piece of paper, but that’s pretty much all it is. I think people pay lip service to it, not only in terms of ageism but also disability and sexism, racism and everything else.

“I think people can have the interview and make their own judgements and they’ll write down what those judgements are, but it is in many cases underpinned by an unspoken personal prejudice – and that’s not recorded, of course.

“You’ll often hear that the individual didn’t meet the mark or didn’t have the experience or didn’t have this or that… when the fact that they were 63 years old and seen as ‘past their sell-by date’ was the real reason for the rejection.”