A POSSIBLE nursing home on a Malvern site where permission for a £6 million spa and hotel complex was granted two years ago has been ruled out.

Developer John Williams, who owns the two-and-a-half acre site off Townsend Way, said BUPA had expressed an interest in building a nursing home next to the planned spa, but Malvern Hills District Council had rejected the idea.

David Murray, the council's head of development control, said: "The site forms part of Malvern's largest employment area and the hotel and spa were acceptable to that and part of the original master plan for Townsend Way."

He said building a rest home was more of a residential use.

Mr Willams, of Upper Colwall, said plans for the hotel and spa were now "progressing."

He said agreement had been reached with Dutch company Pelikan to build the spa and that two companies were competing to build the hotel.

Mr Williams said the hotel chain most compatible with the spa, which will use Malvern spring water, was likely to win the contract.

"There has been a little bit of a lapse in time but I think now things are coming to fruition," he said.

Planning permission for a 94-bedroom hotel and spa was granted in December 2003. A condition of the approval was that the developer would make a contribution towards a cycle crossing on Worcester Road.

Mr Williams has meanwhile bought 12 and a half acres of land near his home at Upper Colwall for use as a conservation area or for grazing horses.