by LAURA BENJAMIN

Amid heckles from a packed auditorium, councillors voted to approve the controversial Tally Ho arts centre last week.

The proposals concerning the £35million mixed use centre will now be considered by a full council meeting on July 27.

Both councillors and members of the public called for further public consultation, saying that previously published results announcing 91 per cent of residents were in favour of all or part of the scheme were misleading. Several also criticised the height of the 49m tower block.

Norman Bar, of the Finchley Society, told the meeting: 'We would very much welcome a multi-purpose hall for the use of local groups and professional organisations but this must be achieved without imposing a grossly out-of-scale residential accommodation block on the area.'

Councillors Lynne Hillan, Kevin Edson and Jazmin Naghar voted against the scheme while councillors Jeremy Davies, Allan Turner, Beverley Pearce and Nathaniel Rudolf voted in favour.

The main points raised by objectors were the over density of the development; a lack of green space; an increase in traffic congestion; a lack of affordable housing and concerns over wind turbulence created by the tower block.

Councillor Lynne Hillan said: 'This site will be vastly overdeveloped and the tower block will be too high ,, that is taller than Barnet House in Whetstone which is already an eyesore.'

But Labour and Liberal Democrats replied that the positive aspects of the scheme far outweighed the negative. Councillor Jeremy Davies said: 'It is clear that we don't have any mixed facilities for the arts in the borough.

The site has been empty for 14 years and the time has come to move on.