STAFF at a nursing home have reacted angrily to proposals to open a funeral parlour next door.

Stockton Borough Council has received an application from the North-Eastern Co-op to change the town's Carlton car showroom, in Norton Road, into a funeral parlour.

The work would include extending the premises and bricking up the display window.

But staff at the Church View Nursing and Residential Home are concerned about the effect the funeral parlour would have on its 47 elderly residents.

A spokesman said: "The residents are at the end of their lives.

"It would seriously affect their morale to be right next door to a funeral parlour and seeing the coming and going of the hearse day and night."

From a business point of view, concerns have also been expressed that the nursing home would be unattractive to prospective residents if it was next door to a funeral parlour.

Despite the objections raised by the nursing home, Stockton council has been recommended to approve the proposal when it comes before the planning committee this week.

In a report to the planning committee, Andy Edwards, director of environmental and technical services, said: "Clearly, concern has been raised about the distressing character of the activity.

"However, funeral directors commonly run their businesses and have their chapels of rest or viewing rooms in residential areas.

"It is generally accepted that they provide a humanitarian service that is valued and necessary to society. Also, that they act in a discreet and sensitive manner in the way they conduct their business.

"This is reflected, for example, by the use of estate cars with opaque sides and rear windows to collect bodies rather than using a hearse."

Mr Edwards went on to say that there was a mixture of commercial, residential and community buildings in the area as the name of the nursing home, Church View, reflected.

He said: "As funerals are one of the main activities which take place at churches, they must be considered to be part of the character of the area."