A LEADING Tory councillor who passed out at the wheel and crashed his car while on a family holiday has been inundated with letters and cards from wellwishers.

Cllr Stuart Lever fell unconscious while driving his hired car with his foot on the accelerator. His wife, Melanie, steered the car into another vehicle to slow it down, before it crashed into a steel post at 30 miles-per-hour and came to a stop.

The couple's four-year-old daughter, Olivia, was in the back seat of the car and slept through the incident, which happened in Florida. It emerged Cllr Lever, who had visited a doctor seeking treatment for an illness, had been given an excessive dose of medicine and was not warned against driving.

Today, the Astley Bridge councillor said: "I've had a lot of cards, letters and emails from people wishing me well and I want to say thank you to them for expressing their concern." Both Cllr Lever and his wife have back and neck injuries.