NEW Mayor of St Helens is Councillor John Mealor (69) who was elected with all the time-honoured ceremony in the council chamber of St Helens Town Hall.

He announced that the exclusive charity for his mayoral year will be the St Helens and Knowsley Hospice.

Councillor Mealor was born in Neston on the Wirral in 1928 and lived there until emigrating to Australia in 1958. He attended Little Neston Church of England School until the age of 14 when he started work as a war-time apprentice in 1942.

He joined the Navy in 1946 and served in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve for seven years.

In 1949 he entered the engineering Industry as a skilled worker and remained within the industry all his working life including spells at General Motors for 14 years and Sperryns Delta Group in St Helens.

Councillor Mealor married his wife Doreen, who will act as his Mayoress, in 1964 having returned to England from Australia in 1961. He had five sons but one died in a motor accident in South Africa in 1989. He also has seven grandchildren and three great grandchildren.

He moved to Haydock in 1978 and in 1987was elected to the council for the Haydock ward which he has represented ever since.

Hobbies and interests include reading, gardening, letter writing and good conversation.

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