Irene Hays receives damehood in New Year Honours
Irene Hays has been made a dame in the New Year Honours.
The Hays Travel boss was recognised ‘for services to training, to education and to young people’.
Hays was described as being ‘absolutely overwhelmed’ and said the honour would have made her late husband John ‘immensely proud’.
"For me it really does feel bittersweet," the BBC reported Dame Irene as saying.
"When I first heard I thought ‘I can’t wait to tell John’, and obviously John’s not here to tell. He would have been immensely proud."
Since its inception in 1980, Hays Travel has nurtured talent, with the damehood recognising the firm’s apprenticeship scheme over the past 40 years.
In addition, Hays Travel launched The Hays Travel Foundation in 2015 which has so far raised £1m to support young people and community projects.
"I feel this really isn’t an award just for me, it’s for all the people who have created the right environment for all those people to succeed and the apprentices and the young people themselves," she said.
Hays Travel was also championed for saving thousands of jobs in 2019 after acquiring hundreds of Thomas Cook shops.
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