I'll try to help you but I need to understand your question more clearly first. When you say the Ubuntu 'toolbar', are you referring to: a) the bar down the left hand side of the desktop which has on it a series of icons, each of which represents an application or program -- so when you want to start a program, you just click on the icon. This is called the 'launcher' in Ubuntu. b) the bar across the top of the screen which normally includes a calendar and an icon showing whether you are connected to wifi; this can also contain an icon showing whether you have new emails waiting to be read. This is called the 'notification area' in Ubuntu. c) some other area of your desktop? (I have Ubuntu but I don't use the Unity desktop, so I need you to explain it to me.)

amanchesterman, It is the the Notification area / bar across the top of the screen (your option b)

There's a thread here which tells you how to do it. The final post using gsettings from the Terminal looks the simplest to me: http://askubuntu.com/questions/510663/remove-thunderbird-from-the-indicator-messages Note that this doesn't remove the messaging indicator itself, it just removes Thunderbird from the list of applications that use it. If you want to remove the indicator applet there's a post here: http://www.hecticgeek.com/2012/05/how-to-remove-messaging-menu-indicator-in-ubuntu-unity/ That's for Ubuntu 12.04, I don't know if it would work for 14.04 but it might be worth a try.

amanchesterman; Thanks for the information & Link, However they do not work. When i type sudo apt-get autoremove indicator-messages into the command line as a result I get is; A symbol for a building with References along the top and see more scopes along the bottom and when left clicking on the symbol it closes the command line window and right clicking does nothing. I guess the above only works for 12.04 & not 14.04

I think you've got two options then: you can hang on here in the hope that another user of Ubuntu 14.04 will turn up and help you or you can post in the Ubuntu help forums here: http://ubuntuforums.org/index.php Personally I'd advise the latter. Your query isn't really about Thunderbird, it's about how to remove the messaging indicator from the Ubuntu Unity desktop, and you're more likely to get a quick answer there. (As I said in a previous post I don't use the Unity desktop myself so I don't have the knowledge you need.)