FEARS for a ‘runaway’ Shetland pony were not enough to make council bosses reject plans for a new village off-licence.

Concerns for the animal had been raised among objections to the store, in Front Street, Sherburn Village.

But the miniature horse was not even mentioned as councillors approved an application for the site, to be called Shergill Stores, to sell alcohol from 11am to 9.30pm Monday to Saturday and 12pm to 8.30pm on Sundays.

Instead, giving evidence at Tuesday's meeting of Durham County Council’s statutory licensing sub-committee, police said they were more concerned about parking, congestion and potential for ‘binge drinking’.

“There’s a concern that to draw custom to this new premises there will be aggressive discounting of alcohol,” Steven Drabik, Durham Constabulary’s architectural liaison officer, told the panel.

He added: “We don’t have any issues at the moment– that’s what we’re worried about.

“The local people are concerned that creating somewhere which is discounting alcohol will attract people not normally attracted [to the village] and will change the nature [of the village].”

PCSO Aimee Guest said the force has tried to prevent off-licences opening in other areas for similar reasons.

Applicant Amrik Singh told councillors he was willing to accept conditions deemed necessary to prevent this.

Mr Singh, who came to the UK from India when he was 18-years-old and who has run shops in Sunderland and Washington, assured the committee his business would not be based solely on heavily discounted alcohol.

He said drink would account for about half his stock and would focus on speciality products.

Speaking on his behalf, friend Stuart Edwards hit back at concerns about traffic and parking, particularly a picture of a damaged car submitted to the panel by a member of the public.

He said: “There’s no evidence of any accidents caused by cars parked outside the bakery.

“People do park out there, but they do adhere to the signs and there’s no evidence to attach a damaged car to any anything that has occurred– that’s a damaged car that could have happened for any number of reasons.”

After discussions in private, councillors agreed to grant the licence, but requested Mr Singh accept stricter measures including maintaining an incident log and appointment of an external training for staff. He will also need to apply to the council’s planning department for a change of use permission to begin trading from the store.