The mother of a teenager murdered in a racist attack has paid tribute to the supportive people of Liverpool as she was made an MBE for her fight against prejudice.
Dr Gee Walker has devoted her life to tackling racism and called for greater public support for the work of the foundation, named in honour of her son Anthony Walker, that is tackling the “evil that racism brings”.
She was made an MBE by the Princess Royal during a Buckingham Palace investiture ceremony for services to diversity and racial injustice.
Dr Walker’s 18-year-old son was killed in Merseyside in 2005 by racist cousins Paul Taylor and Michael Barton, the brother of former Premiership footballer Joey Barton.
The crime prompted widespread condemnation at the time and in its aftermath the Anthony Walker Foundation was founded by his family to tackle racism, hate crime and discrimination by providing educational opportunities, victim support services and by promoting equity and inclusion for all.
Dr Walker said her son’s legacy was “forgiveness” because “he was always a man of love, and I do this for him, and I hope he will be proud of me today for receiving this honour”.
She added: “I honour the people who work behind the scenes tirelessly – my children who are here with me – because they are part of the journey and I could not have done it without them.
“And the people of Liverpool, I must honour them because they stood with me, and this is also for them. They continually supported us in every way, shape and form – so, Liverpool, I salute you.”
She said the foundation was working on an educational programme and was training young anti-racist ambassadors who would graduate this summer.
“I encourage them to be Anthony’s voice, his arms, his legs,” his mother said.
She appealed for public support, saying: “Racism, it’s evil, it’s killing our children, killing the next generation, help us to roll this out.”
Mark Steadman co-founder and chief operating officer of Lone Buffalo, an English tuition and youth development organisation based in Laos, was made an MBE by Anne for services to youth development.
The project was started in 2011 in memory of a Laos man called Manophet, also known as Lone Buffalo, who died in 2010.
He dedicated his life to helping others, spending his days clearing unexploded ordnance from the Vietnam War and his evenings teaching English to local residents.
Mr Steadman said Lone Buffalo gave the teenagers it supported significant roles withing the organisation: “Our whole ethos is to give responsibility to young people, because no-one is born stupid.
“Normally people say ‘you’re that age, you can do this’, we don’t do that, we break the rules. So we just take our young people, and we can see the leaders and we do a lot of development work to train them.”