AFTER all the bad stuff in the news in the last few weeks, I expect we could all do with a little tale of hope. So here’s one.

Last week my great niece, Millie, was chosen as a ‘high achieving pupil’ at her school.

It’s hardly something you would expect to see on the news, and to be honest even her parents aren’t yet sure what it entails, except that it’s good.

In our family, however, it feels like game, set and match to Millie.

To all intents and purposes, she might appear to be just like any other bright young girl who is about to celebrate her 12th birthday.

But Millie has a remarkable story. Early in 2005, her parents, Stuart (my nephew) and Mel got the happy news that their first baby - whom they would come to name Millie - was on the way, and they could expect the happy day to be in October.

Not everything runs to schedule, however, and unfortunately when Millie actually arrived it was still June.

So, compared with expectation, she didn’t just turn up early and couldn’t merely be said to have made her big entry into the world in the wrong month. She actually arrived in completely the wrong season.

In fact, as far as school is concerned, you could even say that being due in October and coming in June effectively means Millie was born in the wrong year.

Stuart and Mel didn’t know who to call first: the proud grandparents or the Guinness Book of Records.

Weighing just a pound and seven ounces and small enough to fit in her father’s hand, Millie seemed to have a lot of challenges in front of her, the first of which was survival.

Even if she was going to make it, doctors warned that such a premature birth meant there was a possibility of “other problems”.

No wonder the first days and weeks of her life were spent in an environment that her dad describes as “like something out of science fiction - all flashing lights and beeping machinery”.

It was 10 weeks before she finally got to leave hospital, getting home just in time for the family to celebrate what they called her ‘0th birthday’, on her original due date.

Well, Millie never did encounter any health problems, and she has been able to sail through school so far, her new official recognition by her teachers bringing the story up to date.

Her achievements are all the more remarkable, of course, because Millie is effectively a year ‘younger’ than most of her class when you take all her bad timing into account.

What she probably won’t fully comprehend until she is older is how she has been an inspiration to others, and much of that will be thanks to the volunteering that Stuart does for an organisation called Bliss that supports parents with newly born premature babies.

He takes his turn on a helpline that reassures them whenever they get anxious, and with Millie’s triumphant story up his sleeve, he no doubt provides timely comfort for parents worried about the prospects - and sometimes simply the survival chances - of their own children.

But of course Millie’s story could be an inspiration for any child facing problems, and indeed anyone who thinks the odds are stacked too highly against them.

She was born and still lives in London, which the news has a habit of painting as the epicentre of this country’s darkest disasters, especially lately. So now would be a good time to remind ourselves that, wherever you are, hope still springs eternal.

And there is nothing better than hopes fulfilled.