A BARNARD Castle town councillor has resigned after saying he felt “gagged” by the council.

Tom Deacon officially handed his resignation letter to the town mayor, Sandra Moorhouse, on Tuesday stating that he felt his position “has become untenable”.

Mr Deacon also accused Cllr Moorhouse of gagging councillors during a recent town council meeting but said his main frustration was with the council itself rather than individual councillors.

He added: “Sadly the current council seems to revel in being outdated and I see no evidence from other councillors of any desire to modernise the town council.

“Morally I also feel that I cannot be part of a council that happily acts in an unfair and inequitable way with private meetings.”

His resignation comes just months after fellow councillor, Thom Robinson, also resigned.

“I’m sorry that he’s resigned; he’s done an awful lot and I did say exactly the same to Thom Robinson,” Cllr Moorhouse said.

“I know they are frustrated and I know that the policies that we have and the law of the land irritated them because they cannot shout about what they want but I’m afraid that’s the way life works and you have got to learn to live within it.”