A SCHEME to build 25 homes on a Portland factory site has been turned down by planners.

Castle Engineering had applied for outline planning permission for the homes on their Perryfield Works site off Pennsylvania Road.

Managing director Trevor Primett told yesterday's meeting of Weymouth and Portland Borough Council planning and traffic committee that the scheme was a vital part of their plans to relocate their works to Southwell Business Park.

He said the company needed to invest in new plant and equipment and to do that they needed to utilise their existing site.

But councillors refused permission because they said a valuable employment site would be lost and any owners of the proposed homes would be badly affected by noise, vibration, blasting and dust from a nearby quarry.

Not everyone opposed the scheme and Rob Coward, who lives nearby, said granting housing would remove heavy industry from the site which residents had had to endure, while it would also enable the company to expand.

Coun Doug Hollings said he felt the replacement of industrial buildings with suitably designed homes would "make a dramatic improvement to this part of the island".

He added: "We are not losing an industrial site. We are relocating it."

Coun Graham Winter said: "What's there at the moment is an eyesore. Relocation will be a vast improvement."

Coun Peter Farrell agreed and said: "If people choose to buy a house near a quarry then that is something for them."

He added that this was world heritage coast and people going to Portland Bill had to go past this "eyesore", a scene which would be enhanced by homes.

But Coun John West pointed out that the site was designated employment land which it was council policy to try and retain.

And he added that it would be "very irresponsible" to allow homes to go ahead and inflict quarry noise, dust and vibration on future residents.

Coun Tina Roebuck said members had to stick by the Weymouth and Portland Local Plan or it would give the wrong message to developers and landowners.

She added: "When the next application comes in, what are you going to do? On appeal you would be shot down."

Coun Jim Churchouse said the site was not in the Local Plan for housing and Coun Anne Kenwood said: "We have to be consistent in our treatment of policy on employment land."

Her words were endorsed by planning manager Simon Williams who said councillors risked shooting themselves in the foot if they were inconsistent over their support for employment sites.

Members narrowly refused the scheme on a 6-5 vote with one abstention.

Mr Primett said after the meeting: "We are very disappointed. The council had an opportunity to secure employment here and it appears to have rejected that purely on the grounds of the Local Plan.

"The decision will not affect us in the short-term, but our investment and future growth will have to be reviewed."