LEADING Ipswich councillor Stephen Barker is to appear in court next month to answer charges relating to the execution of a will.Barker, 58, of The Green, Ashbocking was summonsed to appear at South East Suffolk Magistrates' Court on January 31.

By Paul Geater

LEADING Ipswich councillor Stephen Barker is to appear in court next month to answer charges relating to the execution of a will.

Barker, 58, of The Green, Ashbocking was summonsed to appear at South East Suffolk Magistrates' Court on January 31.

He has been charged with perverting the course of justice in relation to the execution of a will.

He appeared before south east Suffolk magistrates on February 15 and the case was sent to Ipswich Crown Court.

He is due to appear in the crown court for a plea and case management hearing on April 27.

Barker was leader of the Conservative group on the borough council for four years between 2000 and 2004 when it was in opposition.

He had to stand down as group leader in February 2004 after the Adjudication Panel for England suspended him from the council for a year after he was found to have treated a council officer with disrespect.

He returned to the council work in early 2005, by which time the Conservatives had formed a joint administration at the borough with the Liberal Democrats.

However Barker fell out with his colleagues and in early 2006 he left the group to sit as an independent Conservative councillor alongside fellow ex-Tory leader Dale Jackson.

Barker was first elected as Conservative councillor for the Bixley ward in a by-election in March 1995. His current term of office expires in May, but he had already said that he did not intent to seek re-election.

Barker works for White Rose Environmental and is manager of the incinerator at Ipswich Hospital. He is currently unavailable for comment on the case.