A STALWART Yeovil volunteer has received countywide recognition for his efforts to help homeless people and foreign migrants in the town.

Bob Betts, 70, of Kiddles, was last week given the Volunteer of the Year award by the Somerset Alliance of Councils for Voluntary Service.

He received the award at Somerset County Cricket Ground in Taunton from David Cudlip, chair of Age Concern Somerset, last Wednesday.

The accolade follows a similar award he received last year from the Volunteer Centre South Somerset.

Mr Betts started volunteering 11 years ago at Yeovil Night Shelter and is now chair of its trustees.

In 2002, he got a grant from the Millennium Commission to start the Trashbash initiative, a mobile service that helps communities to tackle litter issues.

Soon after that he joined the Somerset Polish Community Association, where he used his skill as a language teacher to help teach its Polish members basic communication skills.

The group has recently expanded to take a broader role in Dorset as well as Somerset, working with people from several Eastern European and Baltic states and renamed as Midwest European Communities Association last year.

Mr Betts' latest scheme is lingo link, where people exchange language skills in one of Yeovil's cafes.

It started when people learning Polish were given the opportunity to meet a native speaker to improve their language skills.

The scheme now involves about 20 pairs of people who want to learn a new language and in some cases teaching is a two-way process.

As well as English and Polish, people are also learning Mandarin, Italian, Spanish and Czech.

Mr Betts, a retired modern languages teacher, said: "It is wonderful to receive public recognition, particularly at the county level. I'd like to thank the people who sponsored me for the award."

He said: "If you think of the world 20 years ago when the iron curtain was slammed firmly down – it was a grim world and people aspired to how things are now.

"Now we need to benefit from how things are and make the world a peaceful place. There are negative people who want to restrict incomers, but for idealists – and I count myself among them – it is a super world. The world is opening up to us."