A BROMSGROVE district councillor has been suspended for three months after using threatening behaviour to a fellow ward representative.

At a special disciplinary meeting, the authority's standards committee suspended Councillor Athol Deakin (Lab-Sidemoor) for breaching Code of Conduct requirements.

The suspension could be reduced to one month if Cllr Deakin apologises in writing to Cllr Bill Newnes (Bromsgrove Independent Group-Sidemoor), who made the complaint, and Cllr June Griffiths (Con-Alvechurch), who witnessed the altercation.

But after the hearing Cllr Deakin said: "This has been a traumatic time and having discussed the issue with my family I will not be apologising.

"But I do apologise to residents in the Sidemoor ward and as soon as the penalty is over I will be representing their cases as strongly as ever."

The hearing related to an incident in June 2004 and involved a complaint by former Labour member Cllr Newnes.

It was the first time the Standards Board for England has referred back a case for a local hearing by the council's own standards committee.

At the hearing Cllr Deakin apologised to the authority and the Standards Board.

He added: "This whole incident has brought into disrepute the district council, the Labour group and my family, for which I am sorry.

"There are causes why this happened. This was a disagreement between two gentlemen and it should never have got this far."

Standards Board legal officer Fariha Ayyub said Cllr Deakin was cautioned by police under the 1980 Public Order Act.

She added: "There may be mitigating circumstances, but this was threatening behaviour. The public has various expectations of councillors, who are important figures in the community, and they should uphold the law." After 45 minutes the committee unanimously took the view that Cllr Deakin's behaviour was unacceptable and a penalty of three months suspension was imposed.

Standards committee chairman Nichola Trigg said they had taken into account Cllr Deakin's full co-operation with the Standards Board investigation and his acknowledgement that his actions were wrong.

But she said he had indicated publicly he was not concerned about the outcome and had failed to apologise to Cllr Newnes.