PLANNERS insist work on Darlington FC's new stadium has not broken guidelines, following complaints about late-night work.

Concern was expressed after the laying of concrete at the £20m ground went on into the night last week.

Jan Mazurk, of the Neasham Road Action Group, which campaigned against the siting of the Quakers stadium last year, claimed planning conditions stating work should cease at 7pm were being flouted.

But Darlington Borough Council, which granted planning permission for the 25,000-seater stadium in February last year, said the only thing the club had done wrong was fail to ask for written permission to work late.

A condition of the approval states any work between 7pm and 7am should be done with written consent from the council, unless in emergencies.

A council spokesman said: "If you put seven to seven on a planning condition, the stadium would never get built, because there are some processes which take longer than 12 hours.

"On a project of this size, it has to be seven to seven, but they can work outside those hours, with written approval."

He said, on this occasion, there had been no such approval.

"It is not a case of them flouting the conditions - they just should have got permission from us," he said.

The spokesman said it was the first time any such concern had arisen, with the developer, Hall Construction, having stuck to the conditions since work began, in February.

Club chairman George Reynolds's assistant, Ian Robinson, was at the stadium at the time and said that there was more noise from work on farmland across Neasham Road than from the stadium.

Mrs Mazurk met planners on Thursday about her concerns, and Mr Reynolds said he wanted to be at any further talks.

The capacity for the stadium is restricted to 10,000 until improvements to the A66 and Neasham Road are completed. After that, the capacity can be increased to 25,000.

Borough planning officer Adrian Miller said the road improvements did not need to be completed until later in the development, so long as they were ready in time for the stadium to come into use.

Read more about the Quakers here.