TRIBUTES have been paid following the death of Philip Clifford, president of Darlington's oldest working men's club.

Mr Clifford died on Monday, aged 67, after collapsing in Darlington's Cornmill Shopping Centre with a suspected heart attack.

The loss came as sad news to Peter Golightly, whose grandmother, Emerline, took Mr Clifford in at the age of 14 from an orphanage in Stanhope, Weardale.

He said that he counted Mr Clifford as his best friend.

"I am just a couple of years younger than Philip and so we grew up together We called each other brothers, and he called my parents mum and dad," said Mr Golightly, of Staindrop Crescent, Darlington.

At the age of 23, Mr Clifford married his wife, Margaret, from Sunnyside, and later moved to London to work.

In the 1970s he returned to live in the North-East, setting up home initially in Newton Aycliffe and later moving to Darlington.

"We never lost touch, but it wasn't until he moved back up that we became friendly again. He would keep in touch we all my family members. He was very grateful for what we did for him," said Mr Golightly.

For the past eight years, Mr Clifford had been president of Darlington Working Men's Club and Institute, in North Road.

Club secretary Doug Heseltine said Mr Clifford was a hard-working man and a close friend.

"He was a good man, a nice man. He would do anything he could to help anybody," he said.