A FURORE surrounding the attempt to grant a war veteran the Freedom of the Borough of Redcar and East Cleveland could see the rules rewritten.

The nomination for Eddie Straight was rejected because his endeavours had taken place outside the borough and the fall out from the row ended in a "car crash" interview as the Mayor, Cllr Brenda Forster, attempted to defend the decision.

Cllr Steve Turner tabled a motion calling on the council to review its "outdated" criteria in the wake of the embarrassing refusal to acknowledge the war hero's achievements.

He said: "I heard the Mayor's car crash interview on Radio Tees when she was defending the decision not to grant Mr Straight the Freedom of the Borough and I felt sorry for her. The entire things was an embarrassment."

Mr Straight, who lives in a nursing home, had not personally asked for the honour. Filmmaker Craig Hornby nominated the veteran after turning his experiences into a documentary, titled 'To Hell and Back'.

The 95-year-old, who was a company sergeant major in the 11th Armoured Division, was shot was shot six times. He helped liberate Belsen, a Nazi death camp, and chaperoned the heir to the throne, the young Princess Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace during the Blitz.

He also took part in the D-Day invasion, commanded former prisoners to help save Londoners during the Blitz and went on to command troops in Burma.

At the time of decision last year, Cllr Forster said: “The nomination for Freedom of the Borough was carefully considered by a panel on behalf of the council and regrettably the panel concluded it was not able to recommend the conferment of the award in this particular case.”

The wording of Cllr Turner's motion said: "In view of recent issues surrounding the process to determine whether this council will bestow the award of Freedom of the Borough, it seems that the longstanding criteria that are currently applied to nominations might well be in need of revision.

"In order to avoid considering future nominations against criteria that may no longer be fit for purpose, this council agrees to establish a cross-party working group to review the criteria and make such recommendations for change as it considers appropriate."

The proposal was seconded by Cllr Wayne Davies and supported unanimously by members of full council.