Lancashire volunteer honoured with an MBE says the King's 'encouraging' words have stayed with her

Sazeda Patel, a 42-year-old civil servant who lives in Blackburn, was honoured with an MBE in 2017 for helping children, young people and families, predominately through her voluntary work with charities and the Scouts.

She was nominated for the award by her employer and was shocked to be recognised, adding that it “wasn’t on her radar at all”.

Mrs Patel was presented with her award by the then-Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace and said his parting words had stuck with her.

The mother-of-three, who is Muslim, said: “I think his parting words were ‘keep at it and keep continuing to do the good work you do’ – I think that those parting words stuck with me.

“(He said) ‘good luck’, because I think everybody understands that work of this nature is very sensitive.

“Those words were very encouraging, to know that (this work) is needed and needs to continue.

“The way he shook my hand and the way he was careful because I obviously had my headscarf on and to make sure that he was putting the award on the right side and made sure it was OK and wasn’t going to fall off or anything but also being respectful. I think that was really nice.”

Mrs Patel said she thought the new King was a “strong character”, adding: “I think he could lead the conversation and this is, for want of a better word, his bread and butter, isn’t it?

“This is what they do. But even so, when you meet that many people and still to be able to give them even one or two minutes of your time.

“You feel like they know everything about you in that quick couple of minutes. So that was amazing.”

Mrs Patel, who is originally from the East Midlands and worked in London, said it was a “culture shock” for her to move to Blackburn after she was married, as there was not as much integration between communities of different faiths and ethnicities as she would have hoped.

She said: “I didn’t want that for my kids, which is why I got involved in starting the Scouts group and started getting involved in more community work where there was a mixture of people; there was a bit more integration because that’s the kind of environment I wanted my children to grow up in.”

She decided to help set up a Scout group in a predominately Asian area and initially started with only a few children.

Now, Mrs Patel estimates that between 200 to 300 people are involved with the group and says the waiting lists are even longer.

Mrs Patel also met the new Princess of Wales in 2013 on a Scout training course.

Commenting on the Princess of Wales’s character, she said: “(She’s) very humbling, very down to earth.

“Just like any normal person would, she attended, she got stuck in; it was minus two, minus three outside – absolutely freezing and we were doing outdoor activities.

“She did everything that all the other leaders would do in training and that’s amazing, to make others feel that you are on