ON Saturday evening last week, five teams from the county entered the Brains Trust competition, held at the Three Pears at Warndon.

The public speaking competition consisted of teams of four aged under 21 who had to discuss three general and farming topics.

Each team's chairman was only informed about the topics 20 minutes before they competed, in a style similar to TV's Question Time.

The general topics included

n Rural Housing

n Footballers' Wages

n The Asylum System

n Supporting the US Over Iraq

n Testing of Drivers for Drugs at Accidents

n Reality TV

n Smoking in Public Places

n Fireworks,

n Will Fishing be Banned?

The farming topics included

n Badger Culling

n Agriculture in 10 Years' Time

n Supermarkets' Hold Over Farmers

n Wind Farms

n Diversification

n Cloning

All the teams kept the audience informed and entertained with serious comments and some amusing moments.

The teams were judged by Geoff Probert who, after giving comments on their performances, placed the teams in the following order, 1st Wythall, 2nd Crowle, 3rd Cutnall Green.