I worked for John both at the English Tourist Board and at the charity Holiday Care of which he was Chairman. Apart from his being very supportive, for me his primary qualities in a work context were his diplomacy and political antennae - indeed I always thought he would have made an excellent UK Ambassador or a Permanent Secretary in the Civil Service! By way of a compliment, I should also say that he was an extremely good delegator - indeed I was minded to say to him once that he off-loaded stres better than anybody I knew! While John was a reserved man who didn't give too much away of a personal nature, I got to know him much better when we linked up after my wife and I moved to Horsham in 1994. He became a trusted friend as over the ensuing years we went walking in the Sussex countryside, visited numerous NT properties, lunched in some excellent pubs and had coffee or cream teas in country house hotels. My wife Lin and I also entertained him to dinner at our house on a number of occasions, which were greatly enhanced by the excellent wine he always brought. He was a fascinating man and we spent many happy hours talking about politics (though I never did discover his leanings in that respect!), cricket, which he played to good club standard when growing up in Bromley, and in particular his National Service. The latter took him to West Germany where as I recall his platoon occasionally took tea with their Russian counterparts, when they weren't eavesdropping on each other across the border! He admitted to me that he was a somewhat green Lieutenant, who basically did what his regular army Sergeant-Major suggested to him behind the scenes! We also shared a love of reading history books about World Wars I and II and regularly swapped tomes on the subject. With his health failing over the last couple of years I took pleasure in visiting him at home to continue our always stimulating discussions. I shall miss his company very much.