Past and present colleagues were in attendance when a Merton primary school headteacher retired after 32 years last week.

Links Primary School, on Frinton Road, hosted a retirement party for Sue Taylor, 63, who announced that she will be leaving at the end of this term. She has been at the school since 1985.

She said: “It was completely overwhelming when I first walked in the room and saw everybody.”

“People had come from all over, there was someone from Jersey, from Northern Ireland, from Malaysia, from Dorset, people that used to work at the school and were ex-colleagues of mine.

“They had all made the effort to come back and to celebrate my retirement, completely amazing.”

Sue described it as ‘extremely emotional’ when she saw that the school hall was decorated in honour of her with various photographs throughout her 32-year career at school.

“I didn’t know anything about it, I knew that it was happening but I didn’t know exactly what for or who was coming so it was really nice surprise,” she added.

The parent of an ex-pupil had also designed a specially made cake decorated in the school’s colours with figurines of children dressed in Links uniforms at the top of it.

It was particularly emotional when Sue met the son and wife of the late Dave Marris, who she worked with for 24 years as a deputy headteacher before he passed away.

“I think it was quite emotional for them too because Dave is still very much a big part of the history at Links.

“We were very different personalities but we shared the same ethos and it was a very good working partnership.”

She added: “We had lots of laughs but we also got lots of things done and made the school what it is today.

“We both obviously wanted the school to do well academically and to enjoy the reputation it does but we also wanted the school to have fun and for the children to have fun.”

What also came as a surprise was the deputy mayor of Merton, Councillor Judy Saunders, attending as well.

“I hadn’t met her before but she was very pleased to be there and, interestingly, she’s actually very local to the school which was also a nice surprise.”

Sue aims to travel to India in her retirement with her husband and visit Links again from time to time.