A QUOTE of roughly £55,000 from a Keighley-based firm has been accepted by Keighley Town Council for the supply of new IT equipment and a replacement phone system.

The town council considered four tenders for the work and opted for the bid submitted by Cosurica, which is based in South Street.

Recommending this business's quote to councillors at their latest full meeting, finance and audit committee chairman Councillor Barry Thorne said: "This is a local firm who gave us an excellent presentation and knew exactly what we needed."

Councillors voted in favour of accepting the offer from Cosurica.

A written presentation to councillors, included in the agenda for the meeting, noted the town council's budget for IT equipment had been only £50,000. But the statement added the extra money required would come from council reserves at the end of the financial year.

Town councillors were also informed that once they have been issued with new laptops, all their relevant paperwork will in future be sent via e-mail, with no hard copies to be sent in the post.

All councillors will need to use the devices issued to them for council business, as use of private digital tablets for this work would breach data protection rules.