HANDS up. Who was it? Ten of you out there have expressed an interest in a referendum which could pave the way to a regional assembly. And that, apparently, constitutes overwhelming support.

That's right, less than 1,000 people in the whole of Yorkshire and Humberside have expressed an interest in such a time wasting exercise. With five million plus inhabitants of the region, proportionally that's less than 10 of the 50,000 residents of Craven.

John Prescott's grand scheme for bringing greater democracy to the regions will do no such thing for this part of the world. It is quite simply unwanted, unnecessary and utterly uninteresting.

Regional assemblies will kill either Craven or North Yorkshire councils, or even both. Voters closely identify with these bodies, however imperfect they may consider them, and when local government was reorganised in 1974 there was a strong campaign to keep this part of the world out of the clutches of Bradford Met.

This time round, little Craven will be swallowed up by a metropolis even larger than Bradford. Mr Prescott's flippant dismissal of our MP's call for North Yorkshire to be excluded from the regional assembly if it votes against shows that our views are already deemed irrelevant.

The Herald will mobilise opinion for a vote against regional assemblies and will suppport David Curry and those who seek to undermine this crackpot scheme.