BOOKS were removed from the shelves of Banbury’s now-famous phone box library as organisations continued their talks over its future.

After initial outcry last month, when BT threatened to call time on the scheme, Banbury Town Council made an offer to ‘adopt the box’ and take it on.

But an ongoing dispute over whether the phone could remain operational has stalled progress.

This week books placed in the phone box, outside St John’s Church, in South Bar Street, vanished from the shelves.

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BT said in a statement: “We can confirm the owner of the books has now removed them.

“In the meantime, BT is in discussions with the town council about a longer-term solution as we’re still very keen for this story to have a happy ending.”

No one was able to confirm whether the shelves would also be removed.

Visit Banbury volunteer Steve Gold said: “There comes a point when you wonder, how much effort can we put into these things?

“It’s not a health and safety issue in my opinion. But that’s the world we are living in.”

BT had originally tried to put an end to the phone box library after health and safety concerns.

Hundreds of people took to Twitter in an attempt to keep the phone box as a library, which prompted BT to then enter discussions with the town council about its future.

More than 2,400 old boxes have been adopted nationwide from BT, housing things such as book exchanges, tourist information centres, heart defibrillators and even an ale house.