AN auctioneers' firm was yesterday given fresh hope over its plans to establish a new base.

The Thomas Watson auction house, in Northumberland Street, Darlington, had submitted proposals to the borough council, seeking permission to create a second home on the Yarm Road industrial estate.

Council officials had recommended the scheme for refusal, saying the development should not take place at an edge-of-town site.

But Peter Robinson, representing the company, urged councillors to go against that advice.

He said taking larger auction items away from the Northumberland Street site, where the firm has been based since 1847, would be beneficial to customers and reduce traffic.

"It is not our sole intention to vacate Northumberland Street - we need premises for the bulkier end of our business," he said. "There are no one or two-acre sites or suitable buildings in the town centre or on the edge of the town centre."

Councillor Gerald Lee said: "The application lends itself to the outskirts of the town centre more than the inside."

However, committee chairman Coun Frank Robson warned that he could foresee terrible problems with heavy industrial traffic if the new site was given the go-ahead.

The committee agreed to defer a decision on the application to allow Thomas Watson to hold further talks with council officers, to determine whether there were better sites available.