"THIS town council is fed up and will not tolerate any more vandalism."

That was the message today from the Mayor of Tadcaster, Coun Richard Sweeting, as he revealed that a public meeting has been called to tackle the town's growing yobbery problem.

He said: "Over the last few months, we've had a lot of vandalism in the town. These people are a menace to society. We don't want people to think we're sitting back and not doing anything about it.

"Even on New Year's Day, someone picked up newspapers that had been dropped off at a newsagents and burned them down at the river."

Coun Sweeting said fires had also been started under the old railway bridge and shop windows had been smashed in the early hours of the morning.

He said: "It looks a mess. We are protectors of the Privy Purse and we've called this meeting to see what we can do as a partnership to make Tadcaster a safer place and improve the quality of life of the people who live in our town.

"We've all played pranks in our time, but it's time people took pride in the community.

It comes down to the old fashioned value of respecting people."

Fellow councillor Donald Mackay said: "There's graffiti and broken glass all over the place. Vandalism in general has without a doubt been increasing recently. The police have increased their presence on Friday and Saturday nights. We hope to get more help from the police - even if it means looking at having CCTV."

The meeting will be held at 7pm at The Ark town council offices, in Kirkgate, on Tuesday.

Tim Grogan, licensing officer for Selby District Council, and a Selby division police inspector have been invited to attend.

The meeting comes after The Press revealed in 2001 that 12 youngsters from Tadcaster had been publicly shamed in a new ploy by police and councillors to combat vandalism.

The youngsters, aged between ten and 13, were brought to book after covering new play equipment in Tadcaster with graffiti.

But instead of charging them with criminal damage, police decided to make them clean up the graffiti - in front of their parents and passersby.

Police officers were given full backing by Tadcaster town councillors before going ahead with the clean-up.