The Shire (the new Arts Culture Heritage organisation) is currently organizing a poll to choose a new flag for Herefordshire.

They claim the county doesn’t have a flag because the Flag Institute, a charity, hasn’t registered it.

I say ‘new’ because Herefordshire already has a flag (and it is a good design, too, representing the county’s agriculture, the River Wye and Herefordshire’s special status since medieval times) and we were flying it from the Market House Heritage Centre in Ross-on-Wye over 20 years ago.

I have seen the Herefordshire flag elsewhere in the country and it has been available to purchase for years as well.

This current vote is a sham because it doesn’t include the flag we already have.

I don’t know who ‘the Shire’ are and why they think they have the power to organise this poll, but rather than promoting our county, they are trampling on its heritage.

Jonathan Gammond
Ross-on-Wye