The Mayor of Leek, Cllr Bill Cawley, has released a statement following the death of the Queen. Read what he had to say below...

This is the news that we have all been dreading and awaiting with great apprehension.

You would have to be in your mid-70s to know any other sovereign than Queen Elizabeth.

She has now sailed into her rest.

Many Leek people in this intensely loyal town will now be reviewing their own lives by reference to events in the long reign of this much-loved monarch.

Royal births, marriages and deaths will bring back memories for many of family gatherings grouped around the TV watching a royal event.

I recall vividly the 1969 TV film "Royal Family" as a particular example.

People will have attended street parties and events marking royal jubilees since 1977 made the fresher by last summer's Platinum Jubilee which was so well celebrated in Leek only weeks ago.

Many will have met the Queen and will have cherished memories of that encounter.

In effect she has become part of our own families.

The Queen's long life was one of unimpeachable service and unvarying duty which began when she spoke as a 14-year-old to the children of the Empire in 1940 in the darkest days of the war until only days ago when she appointed the new Prime Minister Liz Truss.

The Queen will now rest with her royal forebears beside her faithful husband Prince Philip and close to her beloved parents Queen Elizabeth and King George VI.

Queen Elizabeth II's 70-year record of constant duty will be never be extinguished from the collective memory of her subjects in the United Kingdom and the wider Commonwealth.