PLANS to demolish a Victorian school building in Bidford have been given the go-ahead after developers agreed to leave the adjacent school house standing.

Westbury Homes Ltd wanted to demolish both buildings to make way for more houses on their development in Victoria Road but residents went into a bitter battle to keep the bulldozers out.

More than 300 of them signed petitions to Stratford District Council urging planners to turn down the application and councillors joined forces in a bid to get the buildings spotlisted by the Secretary of State for Culture.

The bid to have the school house listed was unsuccessful although the secretary of state did recommend it could be considered for local listing.

Bidford parish councillors have now met the developers and accepted the offer of a unilateral agreement binding them to retain and convert the school house. But when the application was put to the district council's west area planning committee on Thursday protesters were still fighting.

They packed into the village hall at Wootton Wawen where councillors failed to come up with planning reasons for turning down the application and permission was granted subject to the agreement.

Chairman Les Topham said: "It's a sad day when a building of this calibre has to be demolished but I don't think anything else can be done.

"We, as councillors, have to work to a policy. If we refuse an application on a whim or a bit of emotion then we will fall foul when it goes to appeal and that's a waste of taxpayers' money."

Mr Topham added: "Apologies to the residents of Bidford once again. It's out of our hands."