The fundraiser of a Frome MBE holder has now exceeded £7,000 - seven times the initial target - as the modest 98 year old walks one hundred metre every day.

Owen Hillier, who was unpaid treasurer for the Friends of Frome Hospital, the local youth club and the community efforts of Nunney, where he lives, is stepping out every day to raise money for Dororthy House Hospice Care.

Now in isolation in South Wales, Owen told Nub News: " Well I don't do much, I pull on my cardie and get my stick and then off I go. Honestly it is just something I can do, my daughter and son in law do the rest."

Owen and his family have raised over £72,000 for Dorothy House over the years, taking over fundraising that their son, James who was killed in a car accident in March 2007.

Owen who is registered as partially sighted is a war veteran and will be well known to huge numbers of people in Frome.

He was treasurer of countless local organisations:

For 40 years he was treasurer of the Friends of Frome Hospital, 30 years worked for Frome Youth Club and also used his financial expertise in Nunney, where he usually lives.

He was treasurer for the Nunney committee, the local flower show and for all the local churches.

Sadly with his sight deteriorating he had to give up and says ruefully that " I can no longer do my signature either so that won't work."

Owen, whose birthday was on April 5 (" A good day for tax returns he tells Nub News") is a World War II veteran and served with the 1st Bomber Command.

He is also something of a comic suggesting that " If this goes on and I keep going, maybe I will be running the hundred metres by the time I turn one hundred."

All the family are now in lockdown just outside Abergavenny .

The donation site is here Just Giving

Owen is modest about all his work, from the treasurer posts the latest of which he was still doing six weeks ago, through to serving in the local council.

"I just do what I do. It is a small thing, which I can do..we are in a lovely place, but it is isolated, but we are lucky. This coronavirus is a terrible thing. I feel so sorry for everyone who has this awful disease."