This site is a tribute to Bev Playle, who was born on 23 June, 1957. A wonderful wife to John; Daughter; Mum to four children; Grandma to thirteen grandchildren; sister to four siblings; a dear friend to many.  She was an inspiration to the numerous lives she touched and leaves a lasting legacy of love in the hearts of all those who knew her.  She will never be forgotten. After a long battle with Womb Cancer since 2018 and numerous rounds of treatment she died peacefully on 20 June 2024 - in no pain, at home in Honley Yorkshire, surrounded by her loving family.

Bev was passionate about preserving and nurturing the beauty of the earth.  She actively campaigned and lived her life with a passion to limit the devastation and consequences of climate change.   Her private, natural/eco-burial, attended by family and close friends, took place on the 5th July in a beautiful woodland site in Settle, North Yorkshire.  She loved this area of the country holidaying there and spending many hours walking. 

A service to celebrate her life took place on Saturday 20th July 2024 at St David's Church, Holmbridge, Holmfirth and was attended by around 200 people from different paths on her journey of life. As Bev requested, no flowers were given, but gifts were made to various causes that Bev championed.  Her JustGiving page for contributions to Peaches Womb Cancer Charity remains open via www.justgiving.com/fundraising/bevforwombcancer or via this Tribute page. 

You can see three videos shared at her service on this site.

Bev was born in Stockport and was one of six children.  On leaving school she trained as a Registered Learning Disability Nurse at Calderstones hospital near Whalley in Lancashire.  Once qualified she very quickly climbed the ladder in Nursing becoming a Ward Sister and then going on to work in various senior management roles in Lancashire, Surrey, Warwickshire and then back to Stockport.  She was instrumental in promoting the 'normalisation' agenda for people with Learning Disability (LD) fighting passionately for the rights of people with Learning Disability to be given equal rights and opportunities to live a life similar to that of other non-disabled people. She played a key role in facilitating a move away from incarceration of people with LD in large, often cruel, institutions into a supportive, community based life.  Her passion for justice and advocacy for those who are disadvantaged and often discriminated against continued throughout her life both in work, voluntary and other settings. 

Bev had a big heart and a loud voice (both figuratively and literally), refusing to accept injustice and and constantly advocating for the rights of others, many of who did not have their own voice or were not listened to.  She moved back to Stockport in the late 1990's and managed a specialist residential unit and community team based at Treetops in Marple which provided care and support for children and young people often with combined learning and physical disabilities.  Importantly, this service that Bev developed provided short and long-term respite care for parents and carers enabling them and other family members and siblings, to take a break from the constant challenges of caring. 
 
When the services and team from Treetops was transferred to Stepping Hill Hospital in the mid-2000's, Bev took on a wider role as Director of Children's Services for the NHS Trust.  She was central to the design and commissioning of the new Treehouse Children's unit and ended up manging a wide range of professions including medical, nursing, and allied health care professionals.   She then utilised her vast experience in a regional leadership role advising health and social care providers across the North-West of England on Service Improvement and Integration.  In the final years of her career she was Northern regional lead for a national government policy implementation project aimed at improving services and respite short breaks for children with disability and their families: 'Aiming High for Disabled Children'.  She worked closely with ministers and in particular Ed Balls - the then Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families.  She eventually took early retirement in 2014, two years after moving to Yorkshire where John, her husband had taken up a role as Professor and Faculty Dean at Huddersfield University. 
 
Though retired, she spent her time volunteering like it was full time job. Over the years, as well as continuing to serve in the church and Diocese of Leeds as a licenced lay minister and more recently as an eco-champion, she led the Stewarding team at New Wine summer festivals; set up and ran a reading group; started a weekly Café Connect at our church for those who were lonely; campaigned for the Labour party and; during Covid-19 played a key role in the Honley vaccine centre as well as shopping and delivering medications for the lonely and isolated. 

In 2022 when she saw the plight of families in Ukraine she immediately offered our home to someone in need.  We hosted a family and now have a whole new Ukrainian family who we have grown to love - Valentyna - ‘Mia sorella’ (my sister) as she would often say when speaking their shared language of Italian to each other; a newly adopted Ukrainian daughter in Daniella for whom she shouted and searched until she found her a flat when she needed it; and their whole wider family in Ukraine that sadly she never got to meet. Even when she was going through chemotherapy and then immunotherapy, she started volunteering at the Welcome Club in Honley and it was only in March of 2024, when she was so exhausted from treatment, that she stopped volunteering.

She was passionate about caring for the earth, fighting to try and halt climate change and all things eco.  Though this was about trying to make a better, more sustainable world for our grandchildren and their children it was also about justice.  Challenging the greed and injustice that has caused the ecological problems we are already facing and the fact that those most impacted by our actions or lack of action on environmental issues are and will be the poorest and most disadvantaged people and parts of this planet.
 
Throughout her life she touched the lives of so many, many people. Even in her own dying she wanted to remain in control and gladly managed to persuade the doctors to let her come home from hospital to die despite the risks.  Those final three weeks with were precious - surrounded by the family and others who loved her so dearly. She was at peace, and in no real pain and knew where she was going - into the arms of her Saviour Jesus who she loved and sought to serve as well as she could.

Thank you Bev for a life well-lived - we miss you so much.