PREPARATIONS are under way for the celebrations for Yorkshire Day across the former Cleveland area.

The County of Cleveland, set up following a local government reshuffle in the mid-Seventies, was abolished more than five years ago when the four areas - Redcar and Cleveland, Middlesbrough, Stockton and Hartlepool - became individual unitary authorities.

But the Yorkshire Ridings Society said the area's Yorkshire heritage should be treasured and it will visit points throughout the area on Yorkshire Day, August 1, to read the Yorkshire Declaration of Integrity.

The group said Yorkshire is a geographical county and its three ridings, including Teesside in the North, was created more than 1,000 years before local government redefined the boundaries.

Yorkshire Day has been celebrated on August 1 for the last 25 years because on that date in 1759, soldiers in Yorkshire regiments fighting in Germany picked white roses from nearby fields as a tribute to their fallen comrades.

The Yorkshire Declaration of Integrity will be read in Old Norse, Latin and Modern English tomorrow morning at Eston Square, outside Asda at Thornaby and Guisborough Market Cross. On the afternoon it will be read outside the Co-Op on Skelton High Street, the Green Man pub in Brotton and Safeway in Loftus.

On Yorkshire Day itself, next Wednesday, the declaration will be read next to the town clock at Redcar, The Wynd at Marske, the pier entrance at Saltburn, Staithes harbour and Whitby bandstand.