FURIOUS Labour councillors were last night due to demand the resignation of transport and traffic portfolio holder Pauline Hayward over Kidderminster's parking crisis.

Former Kidderminster mayor Nigel Knowles was planning to propose a motion demanding Conservative councillor Mrs Hayward quit her position and clear the way for someone with a "fresh attitude" to tackle the problem.

Fears smaller businesses could go to the wall amid a bleak festive shopping period - stemming from the loss of more than 800 parking spaces - and the alleged failure of Mrs Hayward to address the "fiasco" have sparked the call.

She would not comment on the motion when contacted by the Shuttle/Times & News, preferring to save her response for last night's full Wyre Forest District Council meeting at Stourport Civic Centre.

The council has demolished the Pitts Lane and Market Street car parks and surface car parks to make way for the Weavers' Wharf town centre development and new Kidderminster College site.

Mr Knowles said: "The call is a protest at the way the car park spaces have deteriorated over the last few months, particularly with the demolition of the multi-stories".

He said the fact the problems had started at a time when town centre shops should be benefiting from extra Christmas trade gave "the impression that the council doesn't know what it was doing".

Labour leader Jamie Shaw slammed Mrs Hayward's "personal ineffectiveness in the post" and said: "She has done literally nothing in advance of the problem to try to address it".

He also claimed Mrs Hayward and her colleagues on the council's executive had blocked the setting up of a town centre working party, which Mr Shaw says would have given councillors the chance to consider the issue and make suggestions about how to avoid a crisis.