A former Croesyceiliog School pupil was invited to Buckingham Palace last month to be knighted by the Duke of Cambridge.
Sir Terry Morgan was born in Abertillery but moved to Cwmbran at the age of three. He was made a Knight Bachelor of the British Empire for services to UK infrastructure, skills and employment on Friday 11 November.
Terry left Croesyceiliog School at the age of 15 to become an apprentice at Cwmbran’s Lucas Girling in the 1960s. He moved out of Cwmbran in his early 20s and his career has seen him hold senior positions at major companies including the Land Rover Group and BAE Systems.
Crossrail- A £14.8bn project
The 67-year-old is now the chairman of Crossrail, a £14.8bn project, sponsored by the Department for Transport and Transport for London, to deliver a world class railway that links Reading and Heathrow west of London with the West End, the City and Canary Wharf, to Stratford and Shenfield north east of London and Woolwich and Abbey Wood to the south east.
Growing up in Cwmbran
I spoke to Terry in a 15-minute phone call where he talked about returning to Cwmbran last year for a Lucas Girling reunion, growing up in the town and his passion for apprenticeships.
“We left Abertillery for a better life. I moved to Cwmbran in 1952 just as it was becoming a New Town. I failed my 11-plus. I didn’t live up to what was expected of me. I enjoyed school and ended up as head boy. I played rugby and still remember some of my former teachers. My brother was a year younger than me and he passed his 11-plus and went to grammar school.”
He would like to return to Croesyceiliog School and a talk and a visit were almost arranged.
“One of those charities that arranges for people to go back to their old school contacted me. I almost did that but the school couldn’t find a date.”
Lucas Girling
“They have an annual reunion every August. I went in 2015 for the 50th anniversary.” The event was held at the Olive Tree Club.
“There were some faces I remembered well. Many of the apprentices grew up and grew older together. I left Cwmbran at 21 but my sister still lives there. The engineering school has gone (Wales Online reports that the apprentice school on the site was at the time the largest in the UK while the factory had a workforce of 5,000). Most of what I saw was the same. Croesyceiliog is the same. I can remember playing there when it was a building site.”
Apprenticeships. “I’ve carried that Torch since I left Cwmbran”
His first job in Cwmbran and the opportunities that offered him gave Terry a passion for skills and apprenticeships that is still with him today.
During our chat he is proud to say that Crossrail has already beaten its target on recruiting apprentices.
“Our target was 400 apprentices on Crossrail by 2018. Today it’s six hundred and forty-something. We smashed it. I’m very excited by the growing recognition of vocational skills and apprenticeships. That is from my experience of Cwmbran.”
He is Chairman of HS2 College Governing Body and Non-Executive Chairman of the Manufacturing Technology Centre. Terry led a skills review for the transport sector in support of the Government’s commitment to 30,000 apprentices by 2020.
“That work on skills and apprenticeships is part of my knighthood, not just Crossrail. I’ve carried that torch since I left Cwmbran.”
Sir Terry Morgan
“People call me Sir Terry. But I only let them do it once. It’s still a huge novelty factor. I was at a dinner last week in London and the place cards were in front of us (with Sir Terry on). It did make me smile. I feel really proud that my wife also gets recognition.”
His wife Ann is from Llantarnam and they married in St Michael’s Church, next to the Greenhouse pub. They have two children. Adam Hughes, a former Croesyceiliog School pupil who plays for Newport Gwent Dragons, is their nephew.
Towards the end of the interview I called him Sir Terry (for the second time) and he pulled me up on it straightaway: “What did you call me?”. He was true to his word.
