DIRECTORS at Darlington Farmers Auction Mart have dismissed calls to allow an in-depth analysis of the company’s accounts amid a dispute with a group of shareholders.

The rebel shareholders will ask for the suspension of the company’s managing director Andrew Armstrong and financial director Richard Heseltine in a dispute over bonus payments, at the company’s AGM on Tuesday.

They will also ask for an independent “forensic accountant” to be appointed to analyse the bank accounts of the company.

But the firm’s directors say the independent analysis is “utterly unnecessary” as they will go through the accounts with shareholders, in detail, at the AGM. In a letter to its shareholders, the board of directors said lawyers had checked the bonus payments and confirmed they were legitimate and lawful.

In a media statement, the board of directors said: “The board will present in detail at the AGM the recent success of the company, the income gains made, and the savings achieved, and answer questions which shareholders may have about the project and any other matters. The complete report and accounts will, as is normal practice for any business, be presented at the AGM and so we reiterate our view that a ‘forensic’ analysis is utterly unnecessary and without merit.”

The group of shareholders had made allegations to the police about “financial irregularities” at the company, which is building a new out-of-town cattle mart close to Burtree, but Durham Constabulary has said its inquiries were in their “very early stages” and it had not been established whether the allegations were criminal in nature or not. Directors say the payments were all lawful.