Liverpool football great Kenny Dalglish has been knighted and Oscar-winning actress Emma Thompson made a dame in the Queen’s Birthday Honours – while Network Rail boss Mark Carne has attracted criticism for his recognition.
Mr Carne received a CBE against a backdrop of huge disruption for train passengers in recent weeks, with politicians and rail groups describing the award as a “slap in the face” for commuters.
Labour MP Lisa Nandy called for his honour to be withdrawn, saying there was “absolutely no way that the Government should press ahead with this award”.
“It’s the most astonishing thing to have happened in a week when commuters have been suffering from rail chaos”, she added.
Former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said the award “brought the honours system into disrepute”.
He told BBC’s Newsnight: “We have the most dysfunctional rail system in the western world, I would argue, certainly when it comes to local and commuter trains, so anybody amongst the rail industry leadership – whether it be Network Rail or the Department for Transport – to be given an honour of this kind…is an insult, a slap in the face to millions of travellers up and down the country who are suffering because of the failure of that leadership.”
The Department for Transport admitted the timing of the announcement of the outgoing chief executive’s award for services to the rail industry following timetabling issues was “unfortunate” but added that recent problems should not detract from his overall service.
Network Rail chairman Sir Peter Hendy also defended his “tremendous contribution to our railways”.
He added: “It is right he is honoured just before he retires from one of the biggest and most challenging jobs in UK industry.”
My comment on Mark Carne receiving a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours pic.twitter.com/wXMjiAQ2mT
— Sir Peter Hendy (@SirPeterHendy) June 8, 2018
But one union boss likened the timing of the honour to “rewarding the captain of the Titanic for jumping ship”.
Manuel Cortes, general secretary of the Transport Salaried Staffs Association, said: “Frustrated passengers will see no honour in that at all.”
Meanwhile, also among the honours list in this 100th anniversary year of women’s suffrage are remarkable females including a nun fighting modern slavery and a businesswoman who made her fortune in fake tan – although men outnumber women on the list.
As the NHS celebrates 70 years since its foundation, medics are recognised for their dedication, with health sector workers making up 12% of the 1,057 people honoured.
The Remains Of The Day and Nanny McPhee star is joined on the list by fellow actor Tom Hardy, who is also recognised for services to drama, receiving a CBE, while Keira Knightley is made an OBE for services to drama and charity.
Sir Kenny, who managed Liverpool at the time of the Hillsborough disaster and remained a steadfast support of the families in their lengthy quest for justice, said he was “hugely proud to have accepted the accolade” for services to football, charity and the City of Liverpool.
The 67-year-old Glaswegian and his wife Marina have also helped raise millions of pounds for cancer treatment through the Marina Dalglish Appeal after she successfully battled breast cancer.
Following a wave of terror attacks which struck the UK in 2017, former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Mark Rowley, who led the national response, is honoured with a knighthood.
On his retirement in March after 31 years in policing, Sir Mark was praised by Prime Minister Theresa May for his “dedication to protecting public safety and tackling the evils of terrorism”.
The brother of aid worker David Haines, who was murdered by Islamic State extremists, is made an OBE for his work against terrorism.
Mike Haines dedicated the honour, for voluntary service to tolerance and education in the UK and abroad, to his younger sibling, who was beheaded by Islamic State extremists in 2014 after being taken hostage in Syria.
Billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, the boss of chemical company Ineos who this year topped the Sunday Times rich list with £21.05 billion, receives a knighthood for services to business and investment.
The honour comes almost a year after the death of six-year-old football mascot Bradley Lowery, with whom the player struck up a strong friendship as the little boy battled a rare childhood cancer.
Defoe said it was the “proudest moment of my life” and added: “But it isn’t for me or about me. It’s for Bradley and those he loved.”
The proudest moment of my life to be awarded an OBE. I‘m blessed to have received the honour, but it isn’t for me or about me. It’s for Bradley and those he loved. I’d trade it all for him to be back in our lives, forget the goals and awards, it’s the memories I’ll cherish…? pic.twitter.com/Dcxua0t7bC
— Jermain Defoe (@IAmJermainDefoe) June 8, 2018
World heavyweight champion boxer Anthony Joshua is made an OBE for services to sport, while 20-year-old alpine skier Menna Fitzpatrick, Britain’s most successful winter Paralympian, is the youngest on this year’s list, picking up an MBE for services to Paralympic sport.
In the musical world, rapper and singer Ms Dynamite is honoured with an MBE, under her real name Niomi McLean-Daley, for services to music, while Mobo Awards founder Kanya King receives a CBE for services to music and culture.
Japan-born Nobel prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro, knighted for his services to literature, said he was “deeply touched to receive this honour from the nation that welcomed me as a small foreign boy”.
Renowned war correspondent Kate Adie is made a CBE for services to media, while Stacey Dooley, known for her BBC Three investigative series covering topics ranging from the fight against Isis to the abortion debate, receives an MBE for services to broadcasting.
Among the politicians honoured are Conservative MPs Eleanor Laing and Bernard Jenkin, awarded a damehood and a knighthood respectively for their political and public service, while Labour’s Louise Ellman has also been made a dame for parliamentary and political services.
Holocaust survivor Ber Helfgott, also known as Ben, is knighted for services to Holocaust remembrance and education, one of nearly three-quarters of those on the honours list deemed to have undertaken outstanding work in or for their local community.
Veronica Donovan, a consultant midwife at Birmingham Women and Children’s NHS Foundation Trust, is made an OBE for services to midwifery, while palliative cancer care specialist Debra Smith receives a BEM for services to nursing.
In the business sphere, Judy Naake, who made millions selling St Tropez self-tanning products, initially from the back of her car, receives an MBE for services to entrepreneurship, the community and philanthropy.
Sister Imelda Poole, president of European anti-trafficking network Renate, receives an MBE for services to combating modern slavery.
Howard Tucker is awarded a CBE for services to international justice for his past work as a member of the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.
A former policeman in South Wales, he went to work in Bosnia to help bring people to trial for war crimes committed during the conflicts there in the 1990s.
Of the total number recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list this year, 210 have been made an OBE, 392 an MBE, and 318 awarded a BEM.
Forty-nine percent of the honourees are women, while 10% of all those on the list are from black and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds.
