My friend Patricia Dawes, who has died aged 83, was a secretary and then a press officer at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office before retraining as a counsellor. Born in Spalding, Lincolnshire, to Rudolf Dawes, a headmaster, and Adelaide (nee Binnie), who was known as Jessie, Patricia grew up in East Grinstead. She was only two when her father went on war service. In 1959, she joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office as a secretary, and was posted to Madrid, Romania and Trinidad, making lifelong friendships with people from all walks of life in the local communities. She then joined the FCO Inspectorate in 1974, as secretary to the team of inspectors visiting British diplomatic missions, and these short stays in different destinations all over the world provided her with many enriching experiences. In the early 1980s, Patricia moved from a secretarial role to that of press officer in the British embassy in Paris, where she and I worked together. This represented a new challenge as she faced French journalists asking questions about the prisoners in the Maze, Northern Ireland. Returning to London in 1982 to be near her ageing parents, Patricia used her people-based skills as manager of the FCO’s Diplomatic Service Wives Association, supporting families all over the world. She found that listening to and supporting others was her strength, and, taking early retirement from the FCO in the late 80s, she trained as a counsellor. She joined a team of professional counsellors operating in the private sector in the Hastings area, whose shared aim was to provide affordable counselling to people on low incomes. The success of an application for a national lottery grant meant that, with a dedicated team, she was able to develop the Hastings and Rother Counselling Service. In 2012 it was renamed Counselling Plus, and, with Patricia as chair of the trustees, became integrated into the care structure of the local community, allowing people to seek the help they need in their most difficult times. Patricia received an award for service in the voluntary sector from Hastings Voluntary Action. After her father’s death in 1986, Patricia took over the house in Winchelsea to which her parents had retired. She pursued a wide variety of activities: as an usher at the Globe theatre in London, as a guide at Lamb House in Rye (Henry James’s residence) and within her local parish at St Thomas’s Church, Winchelsea. She was actively connected with projects for homeless people at St Martin-in-the-Fields in central London and joined a local group visiting Palestine in 2011. Patricia moved into a home in Hastings in 2015. Throughout her life, she remained curious about different cultures and concerned for others, both at home and abroad. She is survived by a cousin, Penni.