A hyperlocal news website has hit back at a councillor who told a meeting of her colleagues the publication “needs to be stopped”.

Lichfield Live has criticised Councillor Sonia Wilcox, pictured, who made the remark during a meeting of Lichfield District Council.

The comments were made in a discussion around extending a rule to prevent another councillor, Cllr Bernard Brown, from being disqualified.

But after his resignation emerged at the meeting, Cllr Wilcox criticised Lichfield Live over its coverage of the council’s own report into the matter.

Cllr Wilcox, a Conservative, said: “I hadn’t been on the council for very long and I stood up in the chamber and spoke about Lichfield Live and how they attack councillors and their families.

“I do feel desperately sorry for Cllr Brown. I’ve been reading on my phone all the things that have been said about him on Lichfield Live.

“Part of me thinks some of the things do come from within.

“I have already said before that Lichfield Live is really damning on this council and I feel it really needs to be stopped.”

In response, her Tory colleague Cllr Colin Greatorex said it was “wrong” to cite Lichfield Live as the problem.

He added: “We have a number of people on social media in a lot of different guises who are not ideal members of our society. It is wrong to criticise a publication such as Lichfield Live – it’s more the individuals.”

Criticising the remarks, Independent member Cllr Joanne Grande told the meeting: “Picking out any part of the media and disagreeing with what it says takes us down the route of not presenting ourself as open and transparent to scrutiny.

“I think it’s dangerous if we start down that route.”

Lichfield Live was founded in 2009 by former Birmingham Mail journalist Ross Hawkes.

Ross told HTFP: “We were hugely disappointed to hear the comments which are factually incorrect. A simple search of her name on Lichfield Live shows that we have barely written about her, so quite how she came to the conclusion we had personally attacked her and her family I am not sure

“Her completely baseless and false accusations were made in a meeting which was streamed online and a recording of which continues to appear online.

“Current explanations she has tried to offer do not alter the fact she has dragged our name through the mud in the public arena without reason and continues to do so while the recording of the meeting remains.

“It is ironic that the agenda later in the meeting had an item on the new council engagement strategy where Cllr Wilcox’s colleagues were due to discuss a desire to improve transparency.

“For a councillor with the controlling group to precede this with a call for us to be ‘stopped’ would be laughable if it were not so completely unacceptable.”

Ross went on to thank supporters who had rallied behind the site.

He added: “All of the Lichfield Live team of volunteers who have run the site for more than 12 years have been heartened by the response, particularly from those councillors of all political backgrounds who have sought to distance themself from Cllr Wilcox’s disgraceful comments.

“I hope both the council and her own party will take appropriate action.”