ON it goes with weary repetition -- the troublesome traverse of the travellers in East Lancashire.

Their caravan convoy is on the move again, having in the past two weeks descended on Altham, Nelson, Clitheroe and Burnley. On their travels, they have squatted at a brickworks, at an industrial estate and the car-park of a town-centre store. The bill for cleaning up the rubbish they left in Nelson cost the taxpayer £3,000 and in the Ribble Valley it was estimated at even more.

And in between there has been the rigmarole and expense of the landowners resorting to the courts for eviction orders in what is an essentially-futile business as the trouble over the travellers having somewhere to stay is simply pushed on to a new -- unofficial -- location where the process begins all over again.

It is both frustrating and troublesome, not only for councils, businesses and residents who find a travellers' camp suddenly appearing on their doorstep, but also for the travellers themselves - for they have a right to lead their nomadic lifestyle, whatever others may think of it.

But the real point of this past fortnight's nuisance is the grim familiarity of it all -- it is simply a repeat of the kind of bother that has been going on at different times for years. Is not that because of the law's inadequacy -- and the a lack of sufficient official sites for travellers?

For when anyone sets up camp without permission on private land, it is not a police matter. Instead, it is one the landowner and the campers must resolve between themselves or in a civil court.

Ten years ago, the then government considered making camping without permission a criminal offence and even confiscating the caravans of persistent offenders. That would perhaps have been a too-ruthless step. But is not some beefing-up of the law called for to put a stop to the sorry saga that goes on and on -- perhaps making unauthorised camping a criminal offence on the third infringement?