Jill Westby celebrates her late husband, a lifelong community activist of Jamaican heritage
Your article on the death of Roy Hackett (Bristol bus boycott campaigner Roy Hackett dies at 93, 3 August) struck a chord. Last week, a blue plaque was unveiled on the front of my house to celebrate the life and achievements of my late husband, George Powe, who was of Jamaican heritage and a lifelong community activist. Next week, on what would have been his 96th birthday, his name will appear on the front of a local Nottingham City Transport bus.
One of his triumphs, in the 1950s, was to ensure that the Raleigh bicycle company’s policy of not employing black people was overturned. The crux of the campaign was a letter to the then prime minister of Jamaica, urging him to stop importing Raleigh bikes. This successful initiative not only gave many black people in Nottingham the right to be employed by Raleigh, but also resulted at one point in the company having the highest percentage of black workers in Nottingham. These are but two of the relatively unsung heroes who knew all that time ago that black lives matter.
Jill Westby
Nottingham
