GUEST draws attention to the crap some Gypsies/Travellers have left behind in Whitby on occasion. He may well be right. However, could I also draw attention to an example of the Bleeding Obvious, that the Gypsies/Travellers round here in Stoke (and doubtless elsewhere) have been making their living for generations in part by removing and processing other people's rubbish, since long before words like "recycling", "ecology" and "environment" crept into current political currency.
    I was in a chapel undegoing a refit just down the hill from us a week or two back. A friend of mine was doing the work, and I dropped in to see how it was going on. In the middle of the floor was big heap of assoted cables, pipes etc. Your very young man from Donegal(possibly. I'm guessing) looked in, had a nose around. He had a flatbed truck outside, loaded up with assorted junk. He made a quick assessment, pulled out his roll and said "Fifty quid the lot". Now my mate Peteer said "No" actually, so the lad went off. Peter had is own idea, and took the pile away himself at the end of the day. I was intigued by the lad's business, and how it works, so I asked Peter how much he'd got whn the stuff was weighed in. Seventy five quid, he told me.
   So that's how it works, for those who are unfamiliar with the precise mechanics(as I was). The gypsy lad drives around Stoke, making enquiries, following his nose if he spots some building work. Buys junk off people when he can, sells it for recycling, and makes a few bob. Quite probably without unduly troubling the tax man, if that bothers you.
    So if people occasionally settle somewhere, get moved on and leave a few bits of stuff around. OK, it's disgusting. But please remember the huge pile of crap they are shifting on our behalf every day(and yes, making a precarious living out of it, fair play to them). And they seem to me, on average, to have a bit more respect for traditional music than the average suburbanite. But of course, that may just be my romantic prejudice.