A TOWN council which called police to eject a Labour activist from a meeting is now considering excluding a district councillor who said they owed him an apology.

Forest Council Cabinet member Cllr Richard Leppington, who makes a monthly report to town councillors, said: “If they don’t want me to come, that’s fine by me. I’ll find something else to do on a Monday night.

“If they don’t want to hear what is happening at the district council, they will be the people who are losing out.”

As the district member for Bream, he is not even a ward member for the Lydney area, but agreed to give up his own time to attend the town council’s monthly meeting to provide a report on the district authority.

He was at last month’s Lydney Town Council meeting when it was suspended after Forest Labour Party youth organiser Zac Arnold tried to ask questions in the council chamber.

Cllr Leppington later spoke out in support of Mr Arnold, despite being a member of the Forest First group on the Forest Council.When asked to leave the meeting, Mr Arnold refused to go, and police were called while councillors moved out of the chamber to another room.

After police arrived, Mr Arnold left and was later arrested outside the council offices for an alleged breach of the peace, having said he would not move until councillors had answered his questions.

He was later released without any further action being taken, with Cllr Leppington subsequently telling a reporter from the Review’s sister paper, the Forester: “To call the police and have him arrested was a complete over-reaction.”

But the agenda for next Monday’s (February 11) meeting reveals that the town council is now considering taking action against Cllr Leppington over his comments, and threatening to revoke his “dispensation” permitting him to address the council.

Agenda item 16 says: “To consider the comments made by Cllr Leppington to the local Press concerning LTC’s Meeting Protocol in which Cllr Leppington suggested that the council had over-reacted in calling the police to its last meeting and that the individual was owed an apology.

It continues: “To consider whether members wish to revoke the dispensation granted to this district council non-ward member.”

And it ends by itemising the receipt of Cllr Leppington’s monthly report, ‘if appropriate’.

Contacted about the agenda item, Cllr Leppington said: ”I would have thought it would be courteous to phone me up to let me know about this so we can have a chat about it rather then I find out via a journalist.

“I reported what I witnessed and I still think they over-reacted. I don’t think it warranted calling the police.

“I find it astonishing that they felt intimidated by a 17-year-old kid asking questions.”

The district councillor said he will attend Monday’s meeting, but said: “I don’t have to come. I was invited to come and report about the district.”

In other developments, the council is proposing changes to its standing orders governing the public’s right to ask questions and make representations.

Under the proposal, questions will need to be tabled in writing to the clerk at least a week prior to the full council meeting, which will then be read out by the mayor or chairman at the meeting and a response given.

It adds: “There will be no debate in relation to the verbal response given by the mayor,” but adds that members may request, “subject to the resolution of the full council”, that the topic be a future agenda item or referred to the appropriate committee.

The mayor or chairman will have “the discretion to permit a person to speak on a relevant agenda item at any one of the council’s meetings if they so choose.”

The council is also seeking quotes to audio or visually record future meetings, with two training sessions pencilled in for June.