Manx governor and wife hail volunteers as 'world's best'

Sir John and Lady Phillipa Lorimer came to the island in September 2021

The Isle of Man's lieutenant governor and his wife have praised the dedication of the island's "best in the world" volunteers.

Sir John Lorimer and Lady Phillipa are patrons of 69 charities ranging from Beach Buddies to the Royal British Legion.

Lady Phillipa said people were "amazing" in their generosity in giving so much time to charitable causes.

"They're the best volunteers in the world," she said.

She added: "You see people in their work capacity, then you see them and they're running a charity, and then you see them again and they're doing something else."

"They don't just volunteer for one thing, they volunteer for about five charities."

Echoing the sentiment, Sir John praised the generosity of people's donations to charity, including coming top of Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal per head of capita in 2023.

"It just shows that the Manx people are incredibly generous," he said.

The Lieutenant Governor also gave his support to the Manx Island Games team in July

Reflecting on the last 12 months, Sir John said it had been a "terrific" second full year for the couple in their roles on the island.

On the official side of proceedings, he said the highlight was attending the Coronation of King Charles III at Westminster Abbey in London.

Attending as the King's representative on the Isle of Man, he said it was "an extraordinary honour and privilege" to be able to attend the ceremony alongside Chief Minister Alfred Cannan.

As well as visiting the island's primary schools, Sir John invited school groups to visit Government House

On the island itself, he said the couple's ongoing tour of the island's 17 parishes was proving a good way of getting to know what makes each community around the island "tick".

He said his ambition of visiting each of the island's primary schools was nearing completion, and it had been "interesting but also great fun" to meet so many young children as well as the "amazing" teachers.

Sir John Lormier finished the 85-mile Parish Walk in June

On a personal level, he said completing the Parish Walk was "pretty significant and had quite a long standing impact afterwards, particularly on my feet".

Lady Phillipa said her personal highlight had been cold water swimming around the coast of the island, completing more than 300 sessions since the couple completed the New Year dip on 1 January 2023.

"I've met some really interesting and good fun people to swim with and seen all sorts of wildlife - swam with a pod of dolphins, swam with a minke whale off Port Skillion," she said.

Members of the Isle of Man Corgis Facebook Group also paid a visit

But the couple agreed that their joint highlight was a trip to the Calf of Man, just before the summer season began.

Sir John said: "It just gave us a bit of a pause, we were there for 24 hours or so, and there was virtually no one else there apart from the wardens at the observatory.

"And we were able to spend time with them learning about what they did, particularly in respect to the ringing of the birds, and we were ringing chough and Manx shearwater."

The couple visited the Calf of Man and spent time with the wardens

He said in many ways it was "a microcosm of the rest of the island", which showed how lucky islanders were.

"It was such a positive visit that we're going back again next year at the same sort of time to act a little bit of a recharge of batteries and prepare for a busy old summer," he added.

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