DEFIANT businessmen have vowed they will continue their quest to open a sex shop in a Suffolk village.They were so confident of success from the council that they had already put up the signs for the new shop.

DEFIANT businessmen have vowed they will continue their quest to open a sex shop in a Suffolk village.

They were so confident of success from the council that they had already put up the signs for the new shop.

Councillors quashed the application at a meeting on Wednesday, but the trio behind it say they are appealing against the decision.

Jeremy Ellis, of Campsea Ash, said: "The wrong decision was made and we will certainly be appealing against it.

"In the meantime we will be opening a mail order business from the site anyway. The existing classification of use is described as storage and distribution and that is what we will be doing."

Suffolk Coastal's north area development control sub-committee rejected the application on a number of grounds.

The application for a change of use from industrial use to retail, goes against the village's local plan. Noise and fear of crime were also given as valid reasons for refusal.

Mr Ellis and his fellow applicants Vic Brand and John Mitchell, upset residents by putting up signs on the building on Tuesday evening - before the application was decided.

Their latest declaration is likely to stoke up villagers who hoped that they had seen the end of their battle to stop the premises opening.

Suffolk Coastal District Council has confirmed, that if the trio do open as a mail order business they will be in breach of planning law.

Ivan Jowers, chairman of the committee said: "We were asked by the applicant to agree to a change of use that would enable the unit to be legally used partly as a shop.

"We firmly rejected that proposal, but we have not been asked and therefore not given any formal view on whether they can operate from the premises as a mail order only business."

A council spokesman admitted there may not be anything the council can do about the signs.

He said: "There is no planning law that says you can't put up a sign making a false claim. They could have signs up even if the shop wasn't actually there.

"The only way in which they could breach the law would be if they were above the specified size. If they were found to be too big action could be taken to force the owners to remove them."