Following the Members open day to welcome the Medway Queen back to Gillingham the Society has received very welcome news resulting in the New Medway Steampacket Co being able to rescind many of the notices issued to employees a short while ago.

Medway Queen Preservation Society announced today it was able to retain two of its instructors and a total of 4 apprentices and 1 trainee following Medway Council and the GMB Union offering to sponsor an apprentice.
The Medway Queen Preservation Society wishes to express their sincere gratitude to Medway Council and the GMB union.

A spokesman for the society said this is excellent news and will enable us to be able to proceed with the project to restore the Medway queen at a faster pace than would otherwise have been possible.    

On Saturday 14th December we held an event at Gillingham Pier to celebrate the PS Medway Queen's return to Medway.
The day kicked off with speeches from Vice-President Lady Noreen Chambers, Mayor of Medway, the President of MQPS Mr Marshall Vine, MP Rehman Chisti, Cllr Rodney Chambers, GMB Regional Secretary Mr Paul Maloney, Mr Andrew Summer and Mr Bob Stokes.

Then the ship was opened and groups of 10 were escorted around the PS Medway Queen, it was an exciting opportunity for members of MQPS to get on board the Medway Queen for the first time!

All in all it was a great day, we hope to see more people the next time we hold an event!

Results for the Medway Queen Raffle are below,

Draw by Noreen Chambers - Vice President of the Medway Queen Preservation Society, also witnessed by Society Members.

1st 005820 Mr Alan Tuggey
2nd 03812 Mr Bob Underdown
3rd 06202 Mr D Williams
4th 09530 Mr Doug Patterson
5th 04262 Ms Joan Wise
6th 08453 Unknown
7th 06545 Mr W G Prynne
8th 03247 Peter and Victoria Wood

Prizes included £1000, £300, A Dunkirk signed print, a lamp, a clock, Medway Queen Book by Richard Halton and more.

First off we would like to apologise for the downtime of the site over the last couple of days, we were in the middle of changing our domain host, but now the website is back up and should stay up!

On Saturday 14th December we have our very special Welcome Home Celebration!

We invite all members to our event, the event starts at 10:30 for speeches at 11:30, we have many important speakers like the Mayor of Medway, and Marshall Vine our President.

After the speeches there will be guided tours around the ship!

The event will take place at:

Gillingham pier

Pier approach road

Gillingham

Kent

ME7 1RX

Please note this day is for members only (+1).

Today, the Winter Edition of the MQPS Full Ahead went off!
To all members, they will be at your door shortly,

And also, if any member of the society would like to receive the full ahead by e-mail please let me know by e-mailing tarynpaigeharrison@gmail.com with the Subject 'Full Ahead'
Receiving the Full Ahead by post saves on printing and posting costs.