A CAMPAIGN to save an open space by having it declared a village green was taken to London's High Court yesterday.

Pamela Beresford, of Limetree, Fatfield, is fighting the refusal of Sunderland City Council to register a grassed area in Washington village centre as a village green.

The council intends to develop the land before selling it off to the City of Sunderland College, the court was told.

Douglas Edwards, representing Miss Beresford, asked Mrs Justice Smith to overturn the refusal by the council's licensing committee to register the space as a village green.

The space that Miss Beresford is fighting to preserve is a rectangular grassed area, separated from Princess Anne Park by a row of trees.

Mr Edwards told the court that on Christmas Eve 1998, the city council granted itself planning consent to build a further education college on the land.

Miss Beresford was one of four residents who asked the city council to register the space as a village green last November.

The application was refused in April. While the committee acknowledged the area had been used by locals for 20 years, it claimed it did not equate to a right of use, said Mr Edwards.

A request to the council for a public inquiry was refused.

Mr Edwards said the correct interpretation of a ruling by the House of Lords last year supports Miss Beresford's legal challenge.

But lawyers for the council say their case is backed by the same House of Lords ruling.

A challenge to the council's decision, using the European Convention on Human Rights, which came into force earlier in the month, was abandoned by Mr Edwards at the outset of the day's hearing.

After a day of legal arguments, Mrs Justice Smith reserved her decision in the case to a later date.