CALLS are being made for French company Lafarge and Government agency One NorthEast to reveal plans for a redundant cement works.

Weardale business people have formed an action group to bring jobs to the dale after the closure of the Lafarge UK's Blue Circle Cement works in Eastgate.

Reports identifying alternative uses for the site are said to have ridiculed the area. Local business people want to see the site used for manufacturing, which they believe will be essential to maintaining the infrastructure of the dale.

Suggestions have so far included a Mr Bean type theme park, bee-keeping and an Eco-Disneyland.

County councillor John Shuttleworth said: "Enough is enough we want something done. We want an answer by the end of the week.

"There is an offer on the table that will create 135 manufacturing jobs and it is being ignored.

"We want Lafarge to agree to lease the units and the workshops or pull the place down and retain it as a greenfield site under the conditions that were laid out in 1963."

The forum has backed plans by Westgate businessman Terry Simmons to create a building board factory, providing much-needed jobs.

The forum has criticised One NorthEast saying it has not listened to what the people want.

Coun Shuttleworth said: "We are fed up. We need jobs in the Dales. All they have done is spend thousands upon thousands of pounds worth of tax payers money on useless reports without really consulting the people who live here."

The forum believes there is a hidden agenda and has called for Lafarge and One NorthEast to reveal any plans.

People believe the site has been earmarked for an incinerator and that waste would be transported via the reopened Weardale Railway.

Chairman of One NorthEast Dr John Bridge said there had been no secret negotiations and the proposals for the railway line were as a passenger line. The line at present does not serve the Eastgate site.

He said no decisions had been made.