A crucial budget meeting to decide on council tax increases in North Lanarkshire was disrupted yesterday when 20 SNP councillors walked out after claims a senior Labour councillor accused them of being "nationalist socialists".

The walkout came as the Labour-controlled North Lanarkshire Council prepared to vote on whether to freeze its council tax.

SNP leader Richard Lyle claimed senior Labour councillor Tommy Morgan made his comment as he delivered the SNP's "alternative budget".

Mr Lyle said SNP councillors walked out after Mr Morgan - who represents Airdrie North and chairs the council's audit and governance panel and the Airdrie Area Partnership - refused three requests to withdraw the comment.

Mr Lyle said: "In response to a comment I made about the SNP putting forward a socialist budget, Councillor Morgan said, You (the SNP members) are just a bunch of Nationalist Socialists'.

"This remark was offensive to myself and to my group members given its connotations with political events in Germany during the 1930s and 1940s."

Mr Lyle said he would be calling for Mr Morgan to resign his chairmanship of two committees and would today write to the Standards Commission to complain about his conduct.

Jim McCabe, chairman of the council's Labour group, said last night: "The remark by councillor Morgan was made and explained in its context - that the SNP members were nationalists but they were also socialists - without any inference that they were Nazis as has been claimed."

The vote on the council tax freeze was passed 42-1 in the absence of 20 SNP councillors.