THE GREEN X CODE 1976 - 1989 - In the January of 1976 I was asked if I would have some photos taken for a possible road safety programme for children - The Green X Code. The Green X Code had been in existence for three years and was fronted by three personalities - boxer Joe Bugner, pop singer Alvin Stardust and footballer Kevin Keegan. In spite of their involvement accidents to children in the 4 -11 age group continued to rise at an alarming rate and in 1976 had reached the horrendous figure of 40,000 children per year being injured and killed on the roads in Great Britain. After consultation between the Central Office of Information and the Department of Transport and their advertising agency Ogilvy, Benson and Mather it was decided to give the Green X Code a totally new image with a superman type character fronting the campaign and I was offered the job. Without a doubt the Green X Code campaign which lasted 14 years was the best and most satisfying job I have ever done. We filmed five lots of three commercials and at the same time the Department of Transport asked me if I would like to prepare a show that could be presented at the schools.

The commercials were hugely successful and a large measure of the success was due to the fact that the kids knew that the Green X Code Man was really Darth Vader and it was Darth Vader that was giving them advice. I used to do three schools per day, five days per week, for eight months of the year and because of the success of the campaign in the UK I was asked to visit America, Australia, The Caymen Islands, Barbados and British Forces Bases all over the continent. The net result was that in 14 years I visited 700 towns and cities, over 2,000 schools and gave my talk to over 500,000 children. We reduced the road accidents in the UK from over 40,000 per year to less than 20,000 and if you added it all up the campaign had actually saved over 250,000 children's lives. In the year 2000 the campaigns success was recognised when I was awarded the MBE from HM the Queen at a Buckingham Palace Investiture in June. Even now 15 years after the campaign finished I am still recognised from my Green X activities and people come up to me at conventions to talk about the time I visited their school when they were children. A wonderful job, I would do it all again tomorrow.

My TV credits include:

The Champions
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Saint
Department S
The Benny Hill Shows
Code Name
Callan
Ace of Wands
From a Birds Eye View
Dr. Who
Arthur of the Britons
The Tomorrow People
Doctor at Sea
The Kenneth Williams Show
Space 1999
Crossbow

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