A GARDENER who has served the people of his home town for 42 years as a retained firefighter has been awarded the British Empire Medal.

Tommy Paterson will retire from Saltburn Fire Station on Sunday (June 19), his 61st birthday, and said he was “proud as punch” to have received the award in the Queen’s Birthday Honours.

Mr Paterson has regularly been on-call for 120 hours a week since he joined in 1974 and once received a personal citation from Cleveland's Chief Fire Officer for saving the life of a cyclist by performing CPR.

He has fulfilled the full range of duties from rescuing children from house fires to releasing people trapped in toilet cubicles on trains. He has never taken a day off sick in the last 26 years.

Mr Paterson was a gardener for Saltburn, Marske and New Marske Parish Council and was responsible for planting and maintaining the award winning floral displays in the Valley Gardens in Saltburn, which received the Britain in Bloom Silver Award in 2011.

He said: “I have loved every minute of my job and I will miss the work, my colleagues and all the people I have been in contact with. It has been a huge part of my life and it will be very strange not being involved any more."

Mr Paterson's wife Susan is a hairdresser in Saltburn and daughter Sarah, 26, is a music teacher at Yarm School and an accomplished harpist who played at Prince Charles’s 60th birthday.