Global Radio Chair and pirate DJ knighted

Several radio people were named in the 2012 New Years Honours list – including Global Radio Chairman Charles Allen and MP Roger Gale who started out as a broadcaster on pirate stations Radio Caroline and Radio Scotland.

Celador chairman Paul Smith receives the CBE, while BBC Radio 5 live sports broadcaster Stuart Hall is given an OBE.

You can listen to Stuart Hall talking about his honour on 5 live here in his own inimitable style.

Sir Charles Allen, the former boss of ITV and now Global Radio’s chair has been honoured for his services to the Olympics and Paralympics – he’s a board member of the London 2012 organising committee.

Sir Roger Gale is the Conservative MP for Thanet North, a role he’s done since 1983. Prior to becoming a politician he worked in radio and television, including stints as a reporter and producer for Radio London and working on Radio 1 Newsbeat and Radio 4’s Today Programme. Before that he was a DJ at Radio Caroline in the mid-60s and went on to be Programme Director at Radio Scotland.

Also in the New Year Honours list were MBEs for Kiss and Capital reggae broadcaster David Rodigan, who last year had a series on BBC Radio 2, Surjit Ghuman, the founder of Panjab Radio, and community station Bolton FM’s founder Dorothy Martland who set up the radio training charity DBBC twelve years ago.