Dirty old towns: This year’s losers

THEY’RE in neighbouring counties, but the best and worst of the Tidy Towns entrants are poles apart when it comes to impressing the judges.

Last place in the competition this year went to the Co Galway village of Gort which notched up just 170 marks — 133 less than the total awarded to the pride of Mayo, first-placed Westport.

However, Gort wasn’t alone in failing to make the halfway point of 200 marks out of a possible maximum of 400. Each town is assessed on 10 criteria, just 30 marks of which are given to “tidiness”.