FIVE swimmers have paid tribute to a special little girl this week on what would have been her fifth birthday.

The courage of cancer victim Meg Lockey, of Bishop Auckland, has inspired her family and friends to raise money for the hospital which battled vainly for her life.

Meg endured 18 months of chemotherapy as she fought Burkitt's lymphona, a type of non-Hodgkins lymphoma, but died in January 2001.

On Tuesday, her mother Lisa, gran Lynne Wiseman, Lisa's sister Andrea Loades and friends Claire Robinson and Joanne Lambert were each planning to swim a mile in Meg's memory at the Glenholme Leisure Complex in Crook.

They all wore her favourite colour, purple, as they raised money for Ward 16 at Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary to thank consultant Kevin Winderbank and his staff.

Lisa, 29, who has a little boy Andrew, aged three, said: "Meg was a special little girl. She was wise and funny and she gave us lots of wonderful memories.

"She was very brave and never complained. She was a proper little girl who loved ballet and other things.

"Until the end we never gave up hope that she would live. Yet at the same time I always had a sense that she would not make it. She was too special to stay."

During Meg's illness Lisa and her husband Stephen packed as much as possible into her life, taking her to Disneyland in Paris, Blackpool and to see the Nutcracker at Darlington.

They marked the anniversary of her death on January 8 with a trip on her favourite 'purple train' to York.

Anyone wanting to donate to the hospital fund can contact the leisure centre on (01388) 763204 or write to 2 Tamworth Close, Bishop Auckland, DL14 0RN.