MALVERN Town Council's Best Value report, sent out to all households in the parish, was held up as "an interesting example of the way Malvern taxpayers' money was being spent."

One of the colour brochures posted with a 96p stamp was weighed at the post office by its recipient who found it should have cost just 57p, according to John Redfern, of Malvern Town Action Group.

Town clerk Stuart McDonough said it was an unfortunate mistake and that only 247 brochures had been posted to people who signed a petition at the last meeting. The rest were delivered separately to every household in the town.

Mr McDonough said: "They were franked in batches of 20 and if they were all franked at 96p the machine would have run out of credit."