98 YEARS OLD AND STILL DROWNING IN DROVES...

MANY of you will, I feel sure, be as alarmed as I was to read earlier this week that stressed GPs are set to quit in droves. In the last month alone, I have read of teachers leaving in droves, beggars returning to the streets in droves, Scottish voters turning to Ukip in droves, cyclists committing road traffic offences in droves, nurses leaving in droves, Irish cricket fans turning out in droves, customers turning to small banks in droves, Aberdeen fans leaving in droves, and people volunteering for one- way trips to Mars in droves. The question is: does this country have enough droves to meet the demand?

A search through our newspaper database reveals that in the 59 days of January and February of this year, there were reports of 161 droves. If we scale that up to the full 365 days of 2015, we reach a predicted value of 996 for the year, which would be a higher figure than any year since 2001.

Indeed, since the coalition came to power in 2010, we have seen a rise in the number of droves unparalleled in modern history. In 2010, the total number of mentions of droves in the press was at an all- time low of 235.

The following year it rose to 511 and the figures for the past three years have been 962, 884 and 949. We asked Sir Trevor Driver, President of the Worshipful Guild of Drovers, whether we should be worried by these figures.

“Very worried indeed, I should say,” he replied. “You are quite right to point out the disturbing increase in the raw figures for droves but a closer analysis reveals that they are even worse than they may seem at first sight. For the drover industry to operate at maximum efficiency, as my members know all too well, one needs the number of droves in which people arrive to be as near as possible equal to the number in which they leave.

“Yet so far this year, the phrase ‘ arriving in droves’ has occurred in the press only five times compared with 16 for ‘ leaving in droves’. So at least 11 of the droves in which people left must have arrived empty, which is a terrible waste of our droving reserves.

“If this drove difference is maintained throughout the year, we will end 2015 with 68 more droves having left than arrived. The droves, one might say, will have left in droves.”

The Government were unable to provide anyone to be interviewed but a spokesman from the Department of Droves, Driftwood and Driveways issued the following statement:

“The figures speak for themselves and attest to the success of this Government’s consistent drove policy. We would not be seeing such high numbers of droves were it not for the drove- building programme which we began as soon as we took office.

“Without an increase in the core number of droves in this country, it would not be possible to sustain the level of drove difference we have been seeing, with so many more droves leaving than arriving. It is a result of which we may feel justly proud.”

For the increasing number of people who find themselves waiting for droves to leave on, however, those words will sound hollow.