The Mayor of Hamilton, Charles Gosling, said yesterday that he will not run for re-election.

The announcement comes as the corporation is locked in a legal battle with the Government for its survival.

Mr Gosling, 68, told The Royal Gazette: “Sometimes it gets personal.

“I mean there have been no personal hits against me, or anything like that, but people are not dealing with an individual – the corporation is bigger than one person.

“I have been mayor for three terms and it’s time for a fresh face to come on board.

“It is a good opportunity for someone else to take the position of mayor and show the support there is for the corporation.”

The Government wants to end local elections in Hamilton and St George and turn both municipalities into quangos.

The Supreme Court earlier ruled that the Municipalities Reform Act was not unconstitutional.

But Mr Gosling said he expected the City of Hamilton to win its Court of Appeal case in the next week or so and that municipal elections would be held next May as scheduled.

The case could end up at the Privy Council in London, Bermuda’s final court of appeal.

Mr Gosling said he had already fought off two threats to the corporation from government and was determined not to take the third attempt “lying down”.

He added his proudest achievement as mayor was the replacement of the Union flag with the Bermudian one at the landmark Flagpole on Front Street.

He said: “I get more pride looking at that than another flag.”

He hoped the Government would employ some “rational thought” about Hamilton’s future if the Court of Appeal ruled in the Corporation’s favour.

Mr Gosling first became Mayor in 2009, but lost the 2012 election.

He returned to power in 2015.

Mr Gosling has also headed the Bermuda Zoological Society and was a long serving president of the Bermuda Chamber of Commerce.