Northallerton'S new town manager, Geraint Williams, is full of good ideas, as one would expect from a man starting a fresh job.

Spectator liked the idea revealed last week of a big farming festival and also Mr Williams' other ideas for music festivals. Northallerton could certainly do with an event comparable to Leyburn's Dales Festival of Food and Drink or Thirsk's summer festival organised by the Rotary club.

We also hope Mr Williams' attention will focus on tatty North End. Granted, his powers do not allow him to do anything substantive on his own, but we trust he will use his position to focus attention on the need to do something about this most depressing of gateways to the county town.

We also hope some of the town centre businesses warm to the idea of having a town manager. The post is almost entirely funded from the public purse. Town centre businesses, who are most likely to benefit from the appointment, have been, with one or two notable exceptions, remarkably cool about the idea.

One businessman and local councillor, has even gone so far as to question the validity of the post within a few weeks of Mr Williams starting. It sounds like Mr Williams has got his work cut out.

Tough question

SO many millions being raised for victims of the Asian tsunami disaster and yet one of Spectator's colleagues frets about the most cost effective way of feeding birds in winter instead of some thieving scallywag squirrel.

He started to begrudge shelling out hard-earned money on nuts every time he saw a grey squirrel determinedly chewing away at the cheap plastic container as it hung in a garden tree, finally enjoying unchallenged rich pickings as the bottom fell out and the contents cascaded to the ground.

Until, that is, the miser was told reprovingly that for a few quid more he could invest in a stronger wire container apparently capable of defeating even the most voracious of the bushy-tailed blighters.

Birds, squirrels or humans, millions or financial peanuts? It's one of life's eternal questions.

Chaos predicted

One NorthEast's year-end report lands on Spectator's desk telling him, among other things, that the swanky new business park beside the A66 at Morton Palms, Darlington, is expected to create 1,500 jobs.

Hmm. In this week's paper we report that the preferred option for upgrading the A66 bypass is to only dual the bit between Morton Palms and the junction near Sadberge. The rest, that's from Morton Palms all the way to the end of the motorway just west of Blands Corner, will remain single carriageway for the foreseeable future. If those 1,500 jobs do materialise, the peak-hour queues will stretch back to the A1.