Sonia Shaljean is on a one-woman mission to save fatherless British boys from what she calls a “void of masculinity”.

She’s founded inspiring Essex-based Community Interest Company, Lads Need Dads, which last week scooped a prestigious Centre For Social Justice National Family Award.

Having trained as a criminologist and counsellor and worked on front-line services with troubled men for over 20 years, Shaljean says her immersive and compassionate approach led to an awakening. “I’d worked a lot in anger management and change and started to piece together the affects of absent fathers when I was working across the domestic abuse, probation, homeless and addiction sectors. I started to ask: ‘Why are they like that?’ I saw the common thread of absent dads.