CHRISTIAN prayers could be banned at Worcestershire County Council.

Councillors are considering changing the traditional start of full council meetings for fear of offending members of other faiths.

Ideas include allowing prayers to be taken in a side room, having clerics from different religions appear on a rota, allowing a moment of contemplation and banning all prayers.

But it has left one councillor "heartily sick of political correctness".

"Apparently one person from an ethnic minority is alleged to have said they found it preferential to Christianity," said Coun Tom Wareing, who represents Crabbs Cross, Redditch.

"We're a Christian society, for God's sake. Who on earth is anyone from that tiny minority to change something that's been going on for 116 years?"

Coun Wareing, who was "incandescent" with fury over the proposals, accused a "cell" of councillors of running an "orchestrated campaign to undermine the Christian faith", including abolishing faith schools.

But Coun Dan Wicksteed, the authority's equality champion who drafted the ideas, said the council should consider whether the prayers could be interpreted as offensive.

"One of the things we have to do is think about what it means about being a Christian country and multi-cultural country," he said.

Coun Wicksteed, who represents Worcester St Clement, has received six formal responses to his memo.

He said two or three councillors were annoyed by the ideas, some wanted to remove all prayers while others were upset the topic had been raised.

Both the Rev Phillip Jones, the industrial mission team leader - who has taken prayers before meetings for 10 years - and the Bishop of Worcester, the Rt Rev Dr Peter Selby, declined to comment.