‘Don’t tune our bell,’ Church group pleads

An out-of-tune church bell should be preserved as an “aural link to the past”, a Church of England body has claimed.

The Church Buildings Council lodged an objection to a plan to re-tune the bell, one of eight, belonging to All Saints Church in Stranton, Hartlepool.

Church authorities argued that the 16th-century bell should be restored in order “to achieve a significant improvement in the musical qualities of the whole peal”.

The Consistory Court decided the bell – “caked in grime from industry, salt and sand” – could be re-tuned as it had been previously in 1907.

The Hartlepool Guild of Bellringers secretary welcomed the judgment.