A veterans campaigner says he will still find a way to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day after the Royal British Legion refused to sell him 500,000 poppies.
Harold Payne had wanted to drop biodegradable poppy petals into the English Channel off Normandy as his latest bid to honour fallen troops.
But, he says, the RBL refused to sell him the poppies after learning they were to be put into the sea.
The 83-year-old owner of the Anglia Motel, in Fleet, says he will instead buy real roses to put in the water to mark approximately 16,500 men who lost their lives in the World War Two operation.
Harold has been fundraising to purchase the poppies, something that will continue when he takes the DUKW landing craft he owns to Morrison’s in Pinchbeck on Thursday and Friday (May 2 and 3) and to the Spalding Flower Parade the weekend after.
“I’m disappointed,” Harold said. “I thought it would be a lovely tribute to our boys who lost their lives fighting for this country.
“Even though the poppies I wanted to buy were biodegradable they said I couldn’t buy them.”
An email seen by The Voice states that the RBL’s environment team was concerned about how the poppies would finally cleaned up, and added that putting them in the sea could lead to a complaint.
“It’s a shame,” Harold continued. “But there’s more than one way to string a cat.
“I’m going to purchase as many roses as I can and do it with those.
“They cost a lot more, so I won’t be able to afford 500,000 of them, but I’ll look to get as many as I can.”
