The LMS-Patriot Company is looking for a new chair as current incumbent, Colin Hall, is stepping down from the role.

Hall announced his intention to resign from the role in the August issue of the members’ magazine, ‘Warrior’. He had held the role of chair the LMS-Patriot Company for six year, starting in November 2019 and being formally voted into the role in January 2020.

The LMS-Patriot Company’s Board has expressed its appreciation for Colin Hall’s service, thanking him for his “excellent leadership” and pointing out that he took on the voluntary role “during a difficult time for the project”.

The Board has paid tribute to Colin’s experience in railway management, as well as his enthusiasm and sense of humour, which it says “has guided the project to better times where we now see re-assembly of ‘The Unknown Warrior’ actively taking place”.

The Board will now begin a process which is described as “disciplined”, to appoint a successor to Hall. It is inviting potential candidates for joining the Board and possibly taking on the role of chair to get in touch with the company.

While it carries out that process, ‘caretaker’ arrangements will apply.

Current deputy chair John Hastings-Thomson will lead the Board, and David Tuffin, Director of Hazard and Risk Management, takes on responsibility for leading the process to appoint a new chair.

The Company is continuing its work on 5551 ‘The Unknown Warrior’, and is still on course for completion. Key elements of the work are the construction of the new boiler at Heritage Boiler Steam Services and the assembly of the frames at Tyseley Loco Works.

“I believe that the responsibilities and practicalities of the Chairman’s role are no longer compatible not only with my changed family position circumstances but also with my own physical and mental well-being. It would be easy for me to pray in aid of my family circumstances – over the last two years my close family situation has changed out of all recognition – but the truth is that this is all about my health and energy as a volunteer, neither of which are what they were”.

Colin Hall, retiring chair of LMS-Patriot Company