A statue celebrating the history of hiring fairs has recently been erected in the Lincolnshire agricultural town of Spalding.

Also called statue, or mop fairs, they were first introduced by King Edward the Third of England after the Black Death as a means of regulating labour due to the extreme shortage in the workforce.

They soon became widespread all over Great Britain and Ireland, the practice continuing up until the Second World War.

Spalding, centre of the south eastern riding of Lincolnshire called Holland, was, and still is, the hub of a rich and diverse agricultural community.