A racism debate has been sparked by a comment on Dartmouth Town Council's Facebook page aimed at the town's newest councillor.

Careworker Mary Kiruhi, who comes from Kenya, was co-opted onto the town council just three weeks ago.

Two days later a comment was posted on the council social media page apparently referring to Ms Kiruhi's name, saying 'Sounds local!!'

Now the comment has been removed from the page following demands from town councillors – even though Ms Kiruhi said she did not find it offensive.

And town councillor Andy Carter said of the man who had posted the comment: 'At the end of the day, it does not make him a racist. It just makes him ignorant.'

The controversial comment was made in response to the announcement on the Facebook page that the 'town council is very pleased to welcome our newest councillor Mary Kiruhi who will represent the Townstal Ward'.

At last week's town council general purposes committee Dave Cawley condemned the comment 'offensive' to Ms Kiruhi and bordering on racist.

'It's simply not appropriate,' he said, as he called for it to be wiped from the council Facebook site.

'It's there for anybody to look at and I am very angry about this.'

Cllr Kiruhi, who attended the meeting, said people were bound to form an opinion and added: 'I don't mind. It doesn't matter. I don't think it is offensive.'

And she warned that if everything on the council's Facebook page was subject to censorship 'there will be nothing on there at all'.

The issue was raised as councillors considered how their Facebook page was being run since it was set up last July and how it should be monitored in the future.

The biggest number of hits received on the page was in September last year over the traffic proposals which would have seen the end of free winter parking in the town.

The news of the tourist information centre awards in November got 272 hits and the next biggest was 81 on January 8 when the announcement about Cllr Kiruhi was posted.

A panel of councillors has now been set up to sort out how the Facebook page and the council's website should be managed.

Deputy mayor Rob Lyon said of the comment: 'I think we should feel sorry for the person who put such a silly thing on there. Just leave it on. It's just foolish.'

But Cllr Tessa De Galleani said; 'I think that there are standards and we are a town council and there has to be a bare minimum of what is acceptable.'