Government urged to step in over Malton store wrangle

Malton Town Council has claimed the scheme for the Wentworth Street car park will damage the local economy and undermine trade for independent traders amid warnings the fabric of a centuries-old market town risks being destroyed.

However, developers behind the plans, Leeds-based GMI Holbeck, have stressed that the development is vital to ensure that Malton can compete with rival retail destinations.

A planning inspector ruled in 2011 that Ryedale District Council’s decision to grant planning permission for a superstore on the Wentworth Street car park was flawed, a move that meant the application must be reconsidered by the authority.

A rival scheme has already been approved by a planning inspector to build a store, retailing units and landscaping on the site of Malton’s 80-year-old livestock market, which is due to move to a new site on the outskirts of the town.

It is the latest move in the long-running saga over plans to build a supermarket complex on the Wentworth Street car park which have been rejected by the town council. The revised proposal was a reduction in the size of the supermarket and would include a petrol filling station, car park and landscaping.

The town council’s clerk, Mike Skehan, claimed the process of determining the application appeared to be “unfairly loaded” in favour of the district council, as the landowner and the deciding authority.

“The council should seek advice from the Government and have the application called in for a decision,” he said. “In the meantime, Ryedale District Council should defer the application.”

Councillors have maintained that the application was crucial to Malton’s future as a successful market town.

The district council’s planning committee is expected to make a decision on the scheme at a meeting in the next few weeks.