Nikita Robinson may be known for speaking her mind on the radio – but she said she was stunned into silence after she was included in the New Year’s Honours List.

Ms Robinson said: “When they told me, my heart skipped a beat.

“I’m a woman of words usually, but I didn’t know what to say. I was at a loss for words. I couldn’t say anything.

“I always have questions, but I didn’t have questions then. I had to call them back a day or two later. It was very overwhelming and humbling.”

Ms Robinson, the host of the popular Ladies Room programme on Magic102.7 FM, won the Queen’s Certificate and Badge of Honour for her services to broadcasting.

But she said she was thrilled to also have her work to improve youth literacy highlighted.

Ms Robinson added: “When you do things out of the kindness of your heart, you don’t expect anything in return.

“What I was doing for the community, particularly the literacy part, was that I saw a need.

Ms Robinson said she launched the Ladies Room Annual World Book Day birthday book drive after she was told about World Book Day celebrations in the UK.

She added: “The Government in the UK gives out vouchers for all students up to high school to get free books.

“I thought that I couldn’t do that myself, but there is something I could do.

“We started off with the nursery schools and I just wanted each child to have a new book of their own so they could say it was theirs.”

Ms Robinson said the greatest reward of her literacy work was the reaction of children.

She added: “The best feeling I ever had was when my sons were at Harrington Sound Primary School and I went to pick them up I saw one of the preschoolers with a book in his hand.

“He was just so excited about it. He was there to pick up his sister with his mom and he shouted out: ’Look what I got’.

“I said: ’Thank you, God. Thank you for my cue. I have to keep doing this’.”

She said she was thrilled to have the programme expand into middle and high schools.

Ms Robinson added: “You hear all the negative things about not being able to read.

“You read the statistics about men in jail and one of the things that many have lacked is the ability to read.

“As a mom, as soon as my kids came out the first thing I did was pick up a book to read to them, but it’s not like that for everybody.

“We have to get children excited about reading.”

Ms Robinson added that she heard Kalmar Richards, the Commissioner of Education, say that reading was knowledge and knowledge was power.

She said: “I want everybody to have that power. I want everyone to have knowledge, and one of the key things we have to do is read and the sooner we start the better.”

Ms Robinson she had been bombarded with phone calls and WhatsApp messages of congratulation since the award was announced.