A SMALL community is furious after vandals sawed down its first-ever Christmas tree.

The centrepiece 25-foot tree on the approach to Lower Machen was brought down sometime overnight last Friday - after just one week.

The vandals responsible left tyre tracks leading to the tree, which was left where it fell, along with a set of Christmas lights.

Lower Machen councillor Dean Jenkins, pictured with the felled tree, who is also chairman of the Graig community council, said: "This is the first time we've ever had a Christmas tree in the village and everyone is devastated that someone could do such a vindictive thing.

"This used to be a village populated mainly by elderly people, but now we have a few kids here, so we decided at the Graig community council to spend several hundred pounds and get the tree for them.

"If the tree had been stolen it would still be sad but a little bit easier to understand, but whoever did this has left it there with the lights still on. They have rubbed salt into the wound and it is a crushing blow."

Councillor Jenkins has said it is too late to get another tree so they will have to make do and put what remains of the sawn tree back into the ground.

Two weeks ago the Argus reported how a Christmas tree in Maesycymmer had been sawn down just hours after it had been decorated with lights.

Christine Meader, 32, from Main Road, Maesycymmer, said her six-year-old daughter, Phebe, who suffers from cerebral palsy, was reduced to tears by the act of vandalism.

That tree has now been put back in place.