PLANS to build a nightclub at Flambards theme park in Helston are being held up by red tape.

Kerrier officials were recently given the go-ahead to approve the proposal, subject to matters, including highway issues, being satisfactorily resolved.

But the county council has now said the planning application relating to the development is a departure from the local structure plan because the site lies outside the town.

Because of that decision, Kerrier council has now had to advertise the proposal as a departure and will have to wait several more weeks before further action can be taken.

Kerrier's head of service for planning, Jon Pender, said it was a bureaucratic process which had to be followed.

"There is a set procedure we have to go through now the county council has said that in their view it is a departure from the structure plan," he said.

"They have said that all along, but we have been trying to establish how strongly they felt on the matter.

"Once the advertising period is over we will go back to county and look at any responses we have received before taking any further action."

Mr Pender said it would be his decision whether or not to send the application to the Government Office of the South West.

If the plans were then called in, a public inquiry would have to be held.

That course of action would significantly delay the project, which Flambards officials had hoped would be up and running by next season.