A tenants' leader has quit the board of a trust dealing with thousands of former Council houses saying he feels "only shame" about the way the organisation has developed.

Mike Stocks, a tenant director of the South Bradford Community Housing Trust, said he originally thought it would be "grassroots-led", but claimed the board was a figurehead with very little voice.

He said directors had been told they held the sole responsibility for the trust but officers really had the last word. "It is unacceptable," he said.

Mr Stocks, chairman and founder of the Community Association for Regeneration of Estates (CARE), has been involved since Bradford Council agreed to ballot tenants on its proposal to transfer its 25,000 houses to a trust.

Bradford Community Housing Trust became the umbrella organisation for six district trusts: South Bradford, North Bradford, East Bradford, Bradford West City, Aire-Wharfe and Shipley.

Today Mr Stocks said he would continue as chairman of CARE, which he set up three years ago, and carry on with other work in the community.

Mr Stocks, 63, of The Coppies, Wyke, said CARE now had three action plans which would bring £60,000 funding into five of the estates.

But he said he felt only shame when he looked back on his three years with the trust because it was "anything but" what the tenants had been promised and had voted for.

"The tenants were told this would be a new type of landlord who operated from grassroots levels as against the old Council system that operated from the top," he said. "In fact, nothing has changed."

But today the chairman of the umbrella trust, the BCHT, Councillor Martin Smith, refuted Mr Stocks's claims.

"He has already been subject to a number of disciplinary cautions as a result of his unwillingness to accept group decisions and has been interviewed on breaches of the code of conduct for board directors," he said.

"We are saddened by the bitterness of his resignation letter and hope the board of South Bradford Community Housing Trust can put this behind them and move forward for the benefit of the tenants."

Coun Smith said the group had already spent more than £40 million on improvements in the first year of its five-year £175 million investment and regeneration programme, proving it had kept its promises to the tenants.

Chairman of the Bradford South board Andrew Wilson said: "The trust will be continuing to strengthen and improve the service it provides our customers and is an effective tenant-led organisation.