FURTHER doubts have emerged over the £2.5m sale of North Yorkshire’s former police headquarters as a bitter dispute over planning spiralled amid reports the company set to buy it is up for sale.

Adventure holiday company PGL, which specialises in activity holidays for children, revealed ambitious plans to develop the old Newby Wiske headquarters, near Northallerton, into one of their centres after buying the site from the police in March 2017, subject to contract.

However, local protestors won a legal challenge against planning permission for the activity centre and were awarded legal costs against Hambleton District Council of £19,000.

Now national newspapers have reported that PGL has been put up for sale by parent company Cox and Kings for between £300m to £400m. Campaigners who formed the Newby Wiske Action Group say they will not back down and will make another legal challenge if planning permission is granted again.

Hambleton District Council said it is awaiting further information from PGL before the permission can be reconsidered.

The company failed to respond to requests for a comment but Newby Wiske is featured as”our brilliant new centre in North Yorkshire”on its website.

It states planning permission had been granted and work was due to start on site in January 2018 – but after the legal challenge had been forced to change the opening to spring 2019. The site was due to be transformed into a 550 bed centre employing 109 people.

David Stockport, a member of the Newby Wiske Action Group, said campaigners are maintaining their objections and are also now looking at concerns there has been unlawful development on the site by the police in the past – which has been taken up with Crime Commissioner Julia Mulligan.

He added: “There is no way we are going to back down the likelihood is that planning permission will be refused or we will be back to another judicial review and Hambleton will lose again. The council should start thinking about the public money that they are wasting, we estimate it has cost around £40,000 so far.

“We are not against development, there are a number of other uses residents would find acceptable and Julia Mulligan should discuss options for the hall’s future use with residents.”

The group is concerned the planned centre at the headquarters site, which is in the centre of Newby Wiske, would create increased noise and traffic.

They also fear it would damage historic features of the Grade 11 listed hall parts of which date back to 1684 with major additions in the 1830s when it was a substantial country house, home of the local Rutson family and later the Durham shipping magnate Albert Doxford.