I SEE from the letters column that my old friend Morrice Roger has given me a dressing down for being miserable, and I am quite happy to plead guilty.

Our industry at the moment is subject to a totally unreasonable amount of bureaucratic control with no acceptable appeals procedure.

Partly, I try to use the column to spread the word on the problems in order to relieve the sense of isolation that many farmers will have.

I freely admit that, in so doing, the tenor of the column is a little dark and defensive.

Morrice is quite right - there are always two ways of looking at every problem.

I have castigated DEFRA without too much mercy during the year. Eric Swiers at the market yesterday said he regarded DEFRA as his best customer. As far as he was concerned, DEFRA could do what it liked as long as the money kept flowing!

A New Year's resolution will be to lighten up the column.

There have been a lot of words written about the pantomime of Andrew Wainwright's Yorkshire flag and the ludicrous reaction of the council officers.

Doubtless, they are only expressing what they perceive to be the law, but for the rest of us, it is just plain daft.

With a few friends, we were even thinking that we would buy a couple of hundred Yorkshire flags and make a real display in Ryedale. Would anyone else join in?

On the road into Malton the other day, I spied two workmen on the roadside.

One was enthusiastically digging holes every 12 feet in the verge and the other was just as earnestly filling them in again. I stopped to enquire what they were doing and got the solid reply: "Bejez, there are usually three of us, but Mick is off sick and he's the one who brings the trees!"

A very happy Christmas to everyone.

Updated: 09:57 Monday, December 22, 2003