John Shaw becomes the 30th Springhill Hospice Man of Rochdale

John Shaw is the Man of Rochdale 2024

Springhill Hospice has held the Man of Rochdale awards annually since 1994 with winner after deserving winner taking home the coveted title for their good deeds across the Rochdale borough.

This year the award went to John Shaw.

One of the 43 people who nominated John said: “John is part of the Good Solution Network and he collects food for the Food Pantries, Army of Kindness, Heywood, Middleton & Rochdale Circle and countless other charities in Rochdale. He receives no external funding and relies on those charities to give a donation towards his fuel cost.

"He does a tremendous amount of good work helping feed the hundreds of homeless and less fortunate people in Rochdale.”

John was up against some very steep competition for the title but the sheer volume of support people showed towards him after the win was humbling.

John told Rochdale Online News: "I am so very proud and humbled to be awarded the Man of the Year title.

"I have for many years supported all the varied communities of Rochdale and hopefully the additional attention from this award will bring in much needed funding for myself and my charitable group Help4All and more importantly for Springhill Hospice."

Vicki Barnett, who organises the event as a fundraiser for Springhill Hospice said: “John is such a lovely guy and it was actually really nice to see him being the centre of attention for a change; it’s usually him making other people feel special.

"I’m pretty sure John being nominated is one of the reasons there were so many people in the room that night showing their support for him and for Springhill. We raised just under £40,000 through the event at the Town Hall, which will fund 5 days of the Hospice, so even on their night off all the amazing nominees were still helping other people! ”

Springhill would like to thank everyone who nominated their local heroes, all the event sponsors and of course, to the nominees themselves for their service to Rochdale.