THE Mayor of Calne, Coun Glenis Ansell, has branded a recent protest over air quality in the town a "stunt."

On January 16, Tom Morris, secretary of Calne Labour, dressed up as18th century scientist Joseph Priestley who discovered oxygen and lived in Calne, to protest about local air quality and to call for Wiltshire Council and Calne Town Council to fund a traffic survey.

But Coun Ansell said a considerable amount of work had already been done to improve the air quality in Calne.

"I became involved about 10 years ago- initially councillors and volunteers collected signatures for a petition to reduce the number of lorries going through the town and staged demonstrations. As a result ,Wiltshire Council installed monitoring devices around the town and identified the worst areas, known as hot spots," she said.

"An air quality working group was formed which undertook a programme of several schemes, including Beat the Street - a scheme which successfully changed people’s habits temporarily, so they walked or cycled with their children, instead of driving them to school. The programme also includes a three phased scheme of tree planting and provided bike and scooter racks for schools and bicycles for the local police team. There is still work to be done, but these efforts have paid off because nowadays the air quality in Calne is much improved.

"I consider the Labour Party ‘stunt ‘ to be unfounded and ill advised. It’s on a par with their previous campaign to ‘Stop the Closure of Calne Library’ when the library wasn’t under any threat of closure."

Mr Morris said the town council had done a lot of good work. He said: "Glenis has done a great job as mayor but we do want them to move more quickly on sorting the traffic problem out."

He will present the 275-signature petition to the mayor at a Calne Town Council meeting on Monday.