A bitter row has erupted in the Catholic pilgrimage town of Lourdes over the planned privatisation of dozens of tiny shops and stalls selling holy water and religious trinkets.

For generations, the stalls and shops have been leased by the municipality to local families for minimal rents as a way to distribute the wealth brought to the small French town by pilgrims travelling from around the world.

The local council now wants to sell the shops to private owners in order to pay off municipal debt, but the tenants are up in arms over the plan.

Many families in the town of 13,500 people in the foothills of the Pyrenees hold stakes in the 66 shops and stalls. They argue that their sale will jeopardise their livelihoods because they will be unable to find the money to buy them.

Josette Bourdeu, the town’s left-wing mayor, is anticipating a windfall of at least a million pounds from an initial round of sales this year - with more to follow in subsequent years.