A WOMAN whose dying wish was to donate £50,000 to a Gwent rescue association has been described as "a lovely person who worked hard for all of her life."

Maureen Easton, of Solihull, had never lived in Wales but visited on holiday several times, and after being diagnosed with terminal cancer she asked her two sisters Pauline Young and Jean Boyle to donate a sum of money to the Severn Area Rescue Association (SARA) for a new lifeboat that will be based in Newport.

Pauline Young spoke about her sister’s love of South Wales and Gwent, and said that Maureen had travelled there before with her partner.

She said: “All of our family are originally from Birmingham or Solihull, and Maureen lived in Solihull all her life.

“She did however, have many holidays in Wales and I know her and her partner Paul enjoyed walking and they went to the Brecon Beacons.”

Maureen was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2013 and sadly passed away in August 2015 at the age of 62.

Mrs Young said before Maureen passed away, she asked her two sisters to donate to SARA because “she really appreciated the work SARA did when she was alive.”

“When she was in the last stages of her life she was poorly but she wanted money to go to the life boat and the volunteers,” said Mrs Young.

“She thought it was great and she loved the area so it seemed appropriate to donate to them really.”

Maureen was described as being a “lovely person who had worked all her life in Birmingham City Council laboratories”.

However, her sister said that she was always going that extra mile and doing a lot of other things in her spare time, including being a school governor and magistrate.

Chairman at the Beachley station Mervyn Fleming said the Newport team are delighted to have received such a large donation.

He said: “First of all it was a privilege to meet the family [of Maureen], they are all lovely people and if Maureen was half as lovely as they are she was a great woman.

“It would have taken us between years and nowhere to raise the money for the boat and we had somewhere around £6,000 raised from projects over the last eight years.”

SARA and Maureen's two sisters recently went to visit the lifeboat, which is currently being built by DELTA in Stockport.

It will be capable of operating at full power for 4 hours before refuelling is required, which will prolong the search capabilities of the rescue team.

The boat will also have a built in communications system which enables crew to hear and pass radio messages directly through their helmet microphone, enabling them to carry out other tasks.

The official launch of the new lifeboat will take place on October 22.