A DROP-IN day centre for people with mental health problems is to be opened in Shildon.

The facility will open in Redworth Road in the town later this year in a former corner shop.

Sedgefield Borough Council's development control committee granted planning permission for change of use from a shop to a drop-in centre last week. The scheme has caused a great deal of concern from residents living in New Shildon, who presented the council with letters of objection and a petition with 197 signatures.

Resident Kenneth Hodgson told councillors at a meeting of the development control committee in Green Lane, Spennymoor, that a meeting had been held with the drop-in centre bosses and a lot of the residents' concerns had been addressed. He asked the council to grant it temporary planning permission with a view to looking at the centre again in the future.

Members of the committee voted to give the centre the go ahead and to re-visit the scheme again in two years' time.