KEITH Brooks has returned to his parish council in the hope of finally getting a war memorial built on Horspath Village Green.

And because of the lack of candidates willing to stand for Horspath Parish Council, he has automatically made it on.

The council has said it would like to create a memorial some time in the four-year centenary of the First World War, but Mr Brooks wants the council to hurry up for the sake of the village’s three surviving Second World War veterans.

The 68-year-old Gateley resident, whose grandfather Sergeant Major Edward Brooks won a Victoria Cross in The First World War, said: “I’m trying to hurry them up.

“Unless it gets going soon I won’t live to see the end of it.

“Everyone I’ve spoken in the village to has agreed with me but they won’t speak up.

“We have only got three World War Two veterans left in the village and I’d like to get it done so they can see it.”

Two of those veterans have already backed Mr Brooks’ plans – John Sheppard, 90, and John West, 88, of Blenheim Way, who both served with the Royal Navy.

In November Mr Brooks was threatened with police action after he put a homemade, temporary war memorial on the green – private property owned by the council – on Remembrance Sunday, but no action was taken.

He also drew up plans for a permanent stone memorial on the green and gave them to the parish council, but now the council has launched a village-wide consultation on the subject, asking residents in great detail whether a memorial should commemorate all villagers who died in all wars, all villagers who served but did not necessarily die, or only those not named on the village’s two existing war memorials, both in parish churches.

Mr Brooks said: “The council is making it too complicated.

“The next thing they’ll be asking people what colour and shape it should be. I have had a design for it and everyone seems quite happy with it.”

He said he did not expect to last any longer on the council this time than last.

He said: “As soon as I can get this war memorial done I’ll be off. I would only stay on it if I thought I would have any effect.”

In the Buckinghamshire village of Oakley, where Sgt Mjr Brooks was born, there are plans to create a memorial for him.

The parish council there said it hopes to lay a Victoria Cross paving stone commemorating him in a village churchyard on April 28, 2017.