THE creation of a graveyard wildlife habitat has been branded insensitive by a woman who says she has to hack a pathway to her brother's grave.

Betty Spottiswood says she has to take a sickle with her to clear the way to the grave of her brother, Robert Dodd, who is buried in the churchyard at St James' Church, Hamsterley, Teesdale.

Her brother was buried there in 1964 after he died in a motorbike accident at the age of 25.

Mrs Spottiswood visits his grave annually.

But for the past five years the section of churchyard in which her brother's body is buried has been left to grow wild to attract insects and flowers. Burials take place at a new cemetery.

Mrs Spottiswood, 68, from Bellingham, Northumberland, who married at the church nearly 50 years ago, said: "It is just an absolute wilderness of weeds. Nobody can be bothered to cut it. My brother's grave seems to get worse every time we go. You have to cut your way through.

"I just think it should be kept nice no matter how long the graves have been there. It does not need to be kept perfect, just the grass cut around the graves."

The technical and contracts manager at Teesdale District Council, Alf Wilkinson, said if the authority was alerted to any graves still being visited they could be kept tidy, but the area was now sustaining wildlife.

He said: "This is a long-running argument. Some people want it cut and some people want it left.

"Some years ago, the vicar of the church at the time wanted the grass cut around the church and let the rest go back to nature.

"That was the arrangement and now we have done it. It would be difficult to cut it because the area is sustaining wildlife."