A former town mayor and his wife have been given a ticking off over their daughter's application for a council staff job.

A local government standards committee has found that Brian and Maxine Crossland broke the code of conduct when staying in a meeting of Carterton Town Council while the issue of the job was being discussed.

But Mrs Crossland has branded the man who brought the action, Paul Wesson, a "serial complainer".

Mr Wesson, former town and district councillor, is an international election observer.

He complained to the national Standards Board that Mrs Crossland broke 10 aspects of the code of conduct and her husband four of them in a council meeting last July.

Their daughter was an applicant for the job of administrative assistant at Carterton town hall and they should have left the meeting.

The board decided it was not serious enough for them and handed it down to the local standards committee of West Oxfordshire District Council.

A panel upheld that the Crosslands both breached only two of the issues relating to personal and prejudicial interest. They have not been fined or banned from public office, just told off.

Their daughter did not get the job.

Mrs Crossland said: "We were aware of the code of conduct and looked it up carefully before we asked our questions in the council meeting about the process of the appointment.

"It was a genuine mistake and we have apologised.

"Mr Wesson has form as a serial complainer against town councillors. Perhaps he sees himself as a modern day Don Quixote."

But Mr Wesson said: "If people are doing something wrong then somebody should complain. It just happened to be me because nobody else picked it up."