DON Bowerman is quite right to highlight how the city council has got its priorities wrong, by failing to address the issue of horse dung.

This debate raises its head every year, and yet fails to get addressed on each and every occasion.

While the cities of Prague, Barcelona, Paris, Bruges and the like equip their horses with appropriate collecting sacks, I gather our carriage drivers insist that wearing of such items is harmful to their horses.

What a load of c**p, so to speak! When I called out to one driver "you're not going to leave that there are you?" seeing his horse deposit its load outside the sandwich shop in Whip-ma-whop-ma-gate, he sarcastically replied: "Help yourself, it's yours if you want it". This despite the fact that he had a bucket and spade hooked beneath the carriage - for visual effect only one assumes.

And quite how they also manage to train their horses to "offload" outside Thomas the Bakers and other food related shops amazes me.

While Parisians can enjoy the smell of freshly baked croissants and espressos, we have to put up with the smell of horse dung as we wend our way to and from work. When are we going to catch up with our European neighbours?

Graeme Rudd,

Kerver Lane, York.

Updated: 09:52 Friday, July 29, 2005