HERE we go again. Warmer weather has ushered in those birds of passage we call tourists and a dedicated group of the Faithful City's inhabitants prepare their traditional welcome.

Oh, how the sun glints off the crumpled lager can. Pause dear stranger and savour the exquisite visual feast of blue cider bottle blending into the primary colours of North Quay wallflowers.

And surely, the paint aerosol masterpieces that can be observed - often complete with the signatures of its creators - must surely be worthy of the next Turner prize.

I suppose you've just got to grin and bear it these days. It's the only option left in a city that quite obviously has no interest whatsoever in improving the image it presents to the rest of the world.

I've been writing a weekly column for the last 12 years and just a cursory glance at the files tells me that the state of the Worcester riverbank has been a recurring theme of my weekly rants.

Over this time, council tax has more than doubled, there have been more initiatives than shoes in Imelda Marcos' wardrobe, councillors and other politicians have mouthed pious platitudes and yet precisely nothing has been achieved.

Youths can still be found lining the frontage from Sabrina Bridge to the Diglis Hotel, drinking and smoking dope. Everyone knows this, nearly all agree it can be an unpleasant thoroughfare, but still the authorities bury their heads in the sand and hope the nasty people will go away.

While, the slightest transgression in a motor vehicle will bring down the full fury of the law, backed by steep fiscal punishment, anything goes when it comes to the riverbank.

Fit young people who should quite obviously be working fritter their days away sucking on the end of a tube of metal or plastic. No wonder the Poles and other east Europeans come here for work - how they must secretly laugh and sneer at the hopeless, lost-the-plot English.

Meanwhile, the life of ordinary citizens is impoverished by official torpor and institutionalised denial. To them, I say carry on - but please don't be surprised at the backlash that will inevitably come.