A Conservative Party councillor in England has resigned after being exposed as a former IRA gun-runner.

Maria Gatland, a Tory councillor in Croydon, was confronted by a member of the public who recognised her as the author of a 'kiss-and-tell' book about her experiences inside the IRA.

Known in Belfast at the start of the Troubles as Maria Maguire, she joined the IRA and went on a gun-running mission to Amsterdam with leading republican Daithi O Connaill.

After the 1972 Bloody Friday bombings, when 11 civilians were killed, she left the IRA and later wrote a book about her experiences called To Take Arms - My Year with the IRA.

She then disappeared from public view until this week, when it emerged that she had joined the British Conservative Party and was its education spokesman on Croydon Council.

A member of the public, evidently aware of her past, taunted her about it and she has now resigned her post.