British Humanist Association (BHA) Trustee and President of the European Humanist Federation (EHF) David Pollock is today celebrating his 70th Birthday.
David has over fifty active years in the humanist movement, since he first became involved with the Oxford University Humanist Group in 1961. Since that time he has made an enormous contribution to Humanism both in Britain and internationally. He has been President of the EHF since 2006 and in those five years has been relentless in pursuing the humanist agenda of secularism, human rights and equality within European and international institutions: the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, the OSCE in Vienna, the EU institutions in Brussels. He has been a director of New Humanist magazine for over 30 years and a trustee of the BHA for 24 years, serving as its chair in the 1970s.
In more recent years he has chaired the BHA’s Parliamentary Working Group and has worked tirelessly on its public policy and campaigning agenda and in 2011 received the Distinguished Service to Humanism Award from the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) at the World Humanist Congress in Oslo. He has contributed original thought to the movement as well as personal dynamism.
Speaking to The Times from Strasbourg, where he was meeting NGOs, ministers, and European humanists, he said: ‘I absolutely ignore birthdays; life is a continuum, and I don’t get any older.’
Nonetheless, we at BHA would like to wish David a Happy Birthday.