An email leaked anonymously to the Advertiser has revealed a bitter internal spat among the region's Liberal Democrats.

Its Central Devon candidate has claimed, however, that the row will not affect campaigning for the next General Election.

Cllr Sally Morgan, the party's prospective parliamentary candidate, has said she will continue to fight the new seat, which includes Ashburton, Buckfastleigh, Chudleigh, Bovey Tracey, Teign Valley and the Kenn Valley, despite what appears to be an attempt by someone in her own party to undermine her.

Shortly after the loss of her county council seat in June's local elections, Cllr Morgan was telephoned from 'apparatchicks' at the Lib Dem's London headquarters.

They said how well the party had performed and were requesting 'substantial' donations to party funds.

Cllr Morgan was told the party had never been in a better position to tackle a General Election.

'I no longer subscribe to that particular variety of bull****,' she said in the leaked email, which was addressed to her HQ but only sent to local Lib Dems, including Teignbridge MP Richard Younger-Ross and regional organiser David Robins.

Cllr Morgan went on to say that having donated generously in the past she resented paid staff doing little other than forwarding centrally generated emails, something her 11-year-old daughter could do for 'the price of a tenner and a few bags of Haribo cola bottles'.

She also complained about a lack of party support, saying: 'Perhaps the party thinks PPCs who are councillors and mothers have no time for such fripperies.'

Cllr Morgan said in future the party could 'sing' for additional donations and ended the email: 'Yours, with b****r all to lose, Sally.'

This week she was keen to play down the row but was shaken that one of her own had decided to go public with the internal argument.

She told the Advertiser: 'I'm still a fully paid up member and I'm still the parliamentary candidate.

'Everybody has occasional disagreements with organisations they are involved with, it's perfectly normal. It's nothing you don't move on from and get over.

'Politics is a nasty game and I can only think maybe they [the anonymous leaker] view me as a threat, I don't know, it's taken me as a complete surprise.'

Describing herself as '100 per cent loyal' to the Lib Dems, she said the leaked email episode would be interpreted by people in different ways.

'People will read it however they feel, won't they? Some people will relish it, others will, hopefully, be a bit more understanding,' she said.

'I think sometimes our expectations of politicians to be superhuman are ridiculous, which is why we're in the state we are in politically.

'We're human beings and if you cut us we bleed. And I think that's the problems with politics, people harden themselves up to an extent they become distanced from real people.

'And if that continues nothing will ever change.'

Unable to say who had leaked the email or why, she said: 'I just think this is a symptom of what's wrong in politics, this cloak and dagger unpleasantness which goes on and puts people off.

'It's not nice.'

Both Central Devon Liberal Democrats and party headquarters were asked to comment but had not done so at the time of going to press.