WEYMOUTH and Portland is suffering a desperate shortage of nursery places.

But campaigners are to step up their action for more facilities for pre-school children in the area.

The lack of available spaces was highlighted after planning committee members turned down an application for an extension at Scallywags nursery in Dorchester Road, Weymouth.

After the meeting, Coun Anne Thomas, chairman of the Sure Start Partnership - set up to assist agencies working with children in deprived areas of the borough, said there was a pressing need for more places.

Hardest hit areas include Littlemoor, Melcombe Regis, Westham and Underhill.

Coun Anne Thomas, who backed the Scallywags application, said she was trying to tackle the problem through her role as chairman of the Sure Start Partnership.

It aimed to help parents, carers and all agencies working with children to work together to provide more support and services in deprived areas.

She said: "I am not happy with the number of available day care nursery places in Weymouth and Portland.

"I am disappointed that planners turned Scallywags down because it is a well-run site typical of most day care nurseries which are often provided in this type of residential accommodation.

"Weymouth and Portland should be encouraging such sites not restricting them and I am very concerned that planners are not taking into account changing social needs in the community.

"I shall be raising the need for more day care nursery places in Weymouth and Portland at our Sure Start board meeting next week."

Dorset Early Years Development and Child Care Unit business and financial support officer Robin Foster said: "We sympathise with Scallywags because Weymouth and Portland needs all the day care nursery places it can get to achieve a good balance of different child care options."

He said Early Years wanted to see more such places available in the borough.

Planners said they refused the Scallywags scheme because they were worried at the scale of the development in a residential area. Owners Paul and Belinda Ryan today said that they were launching an immediate appeal.

Mr Ryan said: "We are doing so because we think we have a good chance of winning and because there is an urgent need for day care nursery places in Weymouth and Portland which has a very poor record."

Manager Pauline Lewington, of Chipmunks Day Nursery in Bincleaves Road agreed and said: "I think day care nursery places are very important in the community.

"It would be nice if there was more money and more support for day care nurseries in the borough."

Mrs Ryan had told a planning committee meeting that the new Disability Discrimination Act - which comes in next year - meant they needed to carry out alteration work including access improvements.

She said she also faced the end of a lease on a similar operation at St Anne's church hall and said the Dorchester Road work would let both outlets operate from one site under careful control which would not affect nearby neighbours.

Weymouth and Portland urgently needed more day care nursery places, she said, but planning manager Simon Williams said the issue here was the scale of development, the intrusion on nearby gardens and loss of amenity.

Coun Graham Winter said: "Child care is not the issue here. The scale of the building is and I am afraid that I cannot support it."