It has been another really busy but rewarding week for me. The highlights included reminders of history, a visit to Poznan and further evidence of the potential to increase trade and investment with Poland. The Fourth of June was both the anniversary of the historic 1989 elections in Poland when Solidarity won a remarkable victory and the 31st anniversary of my first arrival in Poland in 1982.
I freely admit that I would never have believed that such elections would take place just seven years later. I attended a ceremony where President Komorowski awarded medals to some of the remarkable people who helped bring freedom to Poland in 1982.
They included two journalists with British citizenship, Chris Bobiński and Kevin Ruane, who I met during my first week in Poland and then worked for the FT and BBC respectively. Congratulations both to them and all the others who were honoured.
I thoroughly enjoyed a return visit to Poznan and the Wielkopolski region, an area that is an economic success story and where there is already significant British investment thanks to big players like GSK and smaller companies like West Coast Energy, who are keen to promote wind energy as part of the Polish renewables effort.
I also attended the 20th anniversary of the Wielkopolski Capital Club, an entrepreneurs organisation which has helped support regional development and was very much inspired at its inception by the British commitment to free market principles. During the visit, I also got to drive the cab of a Mercedes lorry. I am far from being Lewis Hamilton but I even managed to reverse it!
My week finished with a most moving meeting with Cavalry Captain Tadeusz Bączkowski at my house. He is 99 and a British and Polish citizen who is the last surviving officer among those who fought the Germans so bravely at the Battle of Mokra on 1 September 1939.
His eventful wartime career including working with the Colonial Service in Sierra Leone and with the British Army in Europe before becoming a liaison officer with the legendary General Maczek’s First Polish Armoured Division. He was in Poland to receive a Polish decoration. All of us who met him were moved and fascinated by his amazing recollections of his wartime experiences. It was a true honour to meet and talk to him.