Womac party

An evening spent in the very grand and rather lofty surroundings of Chelsea Old Town Hall. Tonight was the evening of the annual Womac fund-raising party, organised by Women On The Move Against Cancer.

This is a charity I have been involved in for 38 years, ever since its formation in 1979. It sprang out of a conversation in the press room at the British Motor Show in Birmingham, and it was the idea of our founder, my good friend and fellow motor racing nut Jean Denton, in response to the demise of talented young Formula One racer Gunnar Nilsson. It's a cruel irony that Jean, who became Baroness Denton of Wakefield, later also succumbed to the terrible disease we are committed to raising funds to fight.

Our target tonight was to raise £15,000 to support Jo's Cervical Cancer Trust, and I'm glad to say we exceeded that. Over nearly four decades our total fund-raising has exceeded £900,000. Onwards to a million!