Mickey Bushell to be awarded Freedom of the Borough
Paralympic gold medallist and European champion Mickey Bushell is to be awarded the honour of Freedom of the Borough of Telford and Wrekin this week.
The 24 year old will be presented with the Freedom Scroll by deputy mayor Councillor Amrik Jhawar at Thursday night’s full Telford & Wrekin Council meeting.
Mickey, of Arleston, stormed to gold in the T53 100m wheelchair racing in the London 2012 Paralympic Games, setting a new Paralympic record of 14.74 seconds in the process.
The Birchield Harrier also won gold in the T53 event at the European Championships earlier this year in Swansea in a time of 15.58 seconds, despite tough competition from French racer Pierre Fairbank.
Councillor Jhawar said: “We have wanted to bestow the honour of Freedom of the Borough on Mickey since he won his Paralympic gold.
“However his schedule of training and racing is so busy that it has taken until now to identify a full council meeting that he is able to attend.
“His triumph in the European Championships last month was a fantastic achievement and I am delighted that Mickey is free to collect the scroll at Thursday’s meeting and I very much look forward to presenting it to him.”
Mickey is wheelchair bound after being born without seven vertebrae in his back. He received the MBE in the 2013 New Year’s Honours for services to athletics.
Royal Mail painted the postbox nearest to Mickey’s house gold in 2012 as recognition of his achievement and the council also painted one of its fleet of buses gold to mark the gold medals won by Mickey and Paralympic archer Danielle Brown.
