A COUNCIL will consider bulldozing up to 500 council homes - but not without the approval of tenants.

That was the promise of the leader of Derwentside District Council, Councillor Alex Watson, ahead of a meeting next week at which radical proposals to regenerate council estates will be examined.

Planners are discussing a number of ways to regenerate estates in Consett and Stanley, and the villages of Langley Park, Dipton and Hamsterley.

Razing whole estates is one option outlined by the director of public services, Mike Clark, along with demolishing selected houses in order to sell patches of land for private development.

The estates affected would include the Moorside estate in Consett, and the Lilly Gardens and Ewehurst estates in Dipton.

Mr Clark said: "Demolishing estates is just one idea for discussion among many. It is certainly not something we would contemplate without the acceptance of residents."

Coun Watson also stressed that no decision would be made without first consulting tenants and indicated the current policy of demolishing small numbers of boarded-up houses would be given serious consideration.

He said: "We find it hard to let homes next to boarded-up properties for obvious reasons, and the problem spreads. We have demolished a small number of homes with the approval of the tenants in the past and that could well be the preferred option."

The demand for council homes has declined across the North-East in recent years. It is estimated that the number of difficult-to-let council homes has risen by just under a third to 50,000 in the past three years.