HERE'S a New Year's message from Ian Liddell-Grainger, MP for Bridgwater and West Somerset:

The turmoil we were all plunged into over Christmas just about set the seal on a turbulent year – a year, I am sure, we are all glad to see the back of.

But as we move into 2021 there are several reasons for being somewhat more optimistic about what it should bring us.

Firstly and most importantly we now have at our disposal the means for protecting ourselves against the Covid virus, and I am delighted the vaccination programme has moved into top gear quite so rapidly.

It has required an immense amount of hard work by laboratory staff and Government officials, all driven by the urgency of the situation. And while I am not going to fall into the trap of making any predictions it certainly appears that life could, if not return to what we used to know as normal, then at least become a little less beset by rule and restriction by the summer which will be a he relief to all of us.

My real concern remains with the hospitality sector upon which the West Country, as the UK’s premier tourism zone, relies so heavily and which has suffered so dreadfully from weeks of lost income.

Talking to people in the sector I know there is a quiet determination to recover from all this and to start trading again as normally as possible in time for the main 2021 tourism season – and I hope the support measures the Government has been putting in place will assist that bounce-back.

The other issue, of course, has been Brexit – and I am sure I am not alone in expressing my relief that the protracted and highly complex negotiations have been concluded. We all know where we stand – even though a detailed reading of the agreement is necessary to learn precisely how our new relationship with the EU will work.

We all now know the hard and fast rules we shall need to follow when we travel to Europe on holiday – a new experience for many people, of course, though faintly familiar to any of us who regularly travelled abroad before the UK became an EU member.

Above all I am hugely relieved that we have avoided a no-deal departure which would have ushered in an unwelcome and hugely damaging deluge of tariffs and controls.

As it is the retailers are forecasting only modest increases in the price of food and drink, while on the positive side consumer support for our farmers has never been stronger, more and more of us are choosing to buy locally-produced food – and for the first time in half a century we shall have every right to boast that British-produced food has no equal!